OF  fflHIcT^ 
OCT  20 1921 


BX  5133    .F3  S4 

Farrar,   Frederic  William, 

1831-1903 . 
Sermons  and  addresses 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2015 


https://archive.org/details/sermonsaddressesOOfarr_0 


Sermons  and  Addresses 

DELIVERED  IN  AMERIC/ii     OCT  BO  1921 


BY 

FREDERICK  W.  FARRAR,  D.D.,  F.R.S. 

ARCHDEACON  AND  CANON  OF  WESTMINSTER 


WITH  AN  INTRODUCTION 

BY 

PHILLIPS  BROOKS,  D.D. 


NEW  YORK 

E.  P.  DUTTON  &  COMPANY 

31  West  23D  Street 
1S86 


Copyright,  1885, 
By  E.  p.  DUTTON  &  CO. 


Press  of  J.  J.  Little  &  Co., 
Nos.  JO  to  20  Astor  Place,  New  York. 


TO 

MY  FRIENDS  AND  HOSTS 
AND  THE  MANY 
FROM  WHOM  I  HAVE  RECEIVED  ACTS  OF  KINDNESS 
THIS  VOLUME 
IS 

GRATEFULLY  DEDICATED 


TNTRODUCTIOK 


These  Sermons  and  Addresses  of  the  Archdeacon  of 
Westminster  have  the  same  qualities  which  have  so 
long  won  for  all  that  he  has  had  to  say  an  earnest  and 
sympathetic  hearing.  They  ai-e  the  utterances  of  him 
whom  we  have  known  so  well  as  the  author  of  the  Life 
of  Christ,  the  advocate  of  Temperance,  and  the  preacher 
of  Eternal  Hope.  They  will  appeal  to  and  inspire  the 
same  love  of  God  and  Truth  and  Man,  the  same 
thoughtful  interest  in  the  things  of  the  Spirit  to  which 
his  other  books  have  spoken. 

But  this  volume  will  also  possess  a  value  and  signif- 
icance peculiarly  its  own.  It  is  made  up  for  the  most 
part  of  sermons  preached  by  an  Englishman  to  Ameri- 
cans ;  that  fact  cannot  fail  to  be  felt  by  those  who  read 
it.  Something  of  the  feeling  which  was  in  the  preacher's 
soul,  as  he  stood  in  our  pulpits  and  looked  our  congrega- 
tions in  the  face,  must  still  linger  in  the  words  of  the 
discourses,  now  that  they  are  printed. 

The  sense  of  likeness  with  the  sense  of  difference — the 
sense  that,  being  Christian  men  of  the  same  race,  we  are 
living  by  the  same  standards  and  seeking  the  same  ends  ; 
and  the  sense  that,  under  our  different  conditions,  our 
methods  of  life  and  ways  of  thought  must  of  necessity 
be  different — it  is  the  combination  of  these  two  which 


viii 


Introduction. 


makes  the  peculiar  interest  of  England  for  the  American 
visitor  or  of  America  for  the  visitor  from  England.  If 
they  were  entirely  alike  or  if  they  were  totally  different, 
the  two  countries  could  not  be  to  one  another  what  they 
are  now. 

And  perhaps  there  is  no  kind  of  writing  which 
more  sensitively  feels  this  double  interest,  of  likeness 
and  unlikeness,  and  more  vividly  displays  it,  than 
the  sermon.  The  true  sermon  has  always  its  general 
and  special  character  harmoniously  united.  It  is  at 
once  the  most  universal  and  the  most  personal  of 
all  forms  of  address.  It  must  speak  eternal  truths — 
truths  true  for  all  men  in  all  times — or  it  is  too  local 
and  narrow.  It  must  also  speak  directly  to  the  men 
to  whom  it  is  addressed,  or  it  becomes  too  vague. 

Therefore,  the  utterances  of  a  preacher  who  speaks 
out  of  an  earnest,  sympathetic  heart  to  Christians  of 
another  nation  which  yet  is  of  close  kindred  to  his  own, 
will  always  have  a  value  distinct  from  that  which  be- 
longs to  all  his  other  writings.  Such  a  preacher  has 
come  to  America  this  autumn,  and  this  volume  com- 
prises the  Sermons  he  has  preached. 

Dr.  Farrar  has  been  for  years  no  stranger  to  Ameri- 
cans. But  they  who  have  long  counted  him  their  friend 
and  teacher,  and  who  have  now  enjoyed  the  privilege  of 
looking  in  his  face  and  listening  to  his  voice,  will  treasure 
these  words  which  he  has  spoken  especially  to  them,  and 
will  keep  them  as  a  valued  memorial  of  his  most  wel- 
come visit.  P.  B. 

Boston,  November,  1885. 


PREFACE. 


These  Sermons  and  Addresses  are  published  in  accord- 
ance with  the  wishes  of  many  who,  after  hearing  them, 
expressed  a  desire  to  have  them  in  a  permanent  form. 
As  it  was  necessary  to  pass  them  through  the  press  be- 
foi'e  leaving  America,  I  fear  that  tliey  may  suffer  from 
the  lack  of  greater  time  and  better  opportunity  to  sub- 
mit them  to  careful  revision.  But,  if  only  they  are 
received  with  a  tenth  part  of  the  kindness  which  has 
everywhere  been  bestowed  upon  the  author,  I  may  rely 
on  the  indulgent  welcome  of  many  readers.  And  so  I 
send  them  forth,  with  the  earnest  prayer  that  they 
may  be  blessed  by  God  to  the  furtherance  of  the  cause 
of  truth  and  holiness. 

Frederic  W.  Farrar. 
Cleveland,  Ohio,  Nov.  20,  1885. 


CONTENTS. 


I.— CHRIST'S  LESSON   PROM  THE  LILIES  AND 
THE  SPARROWS. 

"  Therefore  I  say  unto  you,  Take  no  thought  for  your 
life,  what  ye  shall  eat,  or  what  ye  shall  drink  ;  nor 


yet  for  your  body,  what  ye  shall  put  on.  Is  not 
the  life  more  than  meat,  and  the  body  more  than 
raiment  ?" — Matt.  vi.  25   1 

II.— AWAKENMENT. 

"Wherefore  he  saith.  Awake  thou  that  sleepest." — 
Eph.  t.  14   15 

III.  — NOT  A  SECTARIAN  CHRIST. 

"  Is  Christ  divided  ?  "—1  Cor.  i.  13   29 

IV.  — THE  LION  IN  THE  HEART. 

"  Thou  shalt  tread  upon  the  lion  and  adder  ;  the  young 
lion  and  the  dragon  shalt  thou  trample  under  feet." 
— Ps.  xci.  13   43 


v.— THE   RETRIBUTION   UPON  SELFISH  SOCIE- 
TIES. 

"And  when  He  was  come  near,  He  beheld  the  city, 
and  wept  over  it,  saying.  If  thou  hadst  known, 
even  thou,  at  least  in  this  thy  day,  the  things  which 
belong  unto  thy  peace ! — But  now  they  are  hid  from 
thine  eyes." — Luke  xix.  41,  42   60 


X 


Contents. 


SERMON  PAGE 

VI.— THE  BEATITUDE  OP  MEN'S  REVILING. 

"  Blessed  are  ye  when  men  shall  revile  you  and  perse- 
cute you,  and  shall  say  all  manner  of  evil  against 
you  falsely,  for  my  sake." — Matt.  v.  11   76 

VII.— THE  LOST  SHEEP. 

"  Rejoice  with  me,  for  I  have  found  my  sheep  which 
was  lost." — Luke  xv.  6   93 


VIIL— THE  LOST  COIN. 

"Either  what  woman,  having  ten  pieces  of  silver,  if 
she  lose  one  piece,  doth  not  light  a  candle,  and 
sweep  the  house,  and  seek  diligently  till  she  find 


it  ?"— Luke  xv.  8   Ill 

IX.— THINGS  WHICH  CANNOT  BE  SHAKEN. 

"And  this  word,  Yet  once  more,  signifieth  the  remov- 
ing of  those  things  that  are  shaken,  as  of  things 
that  are  made,  that  those  things  which  cannot  be 
shaken  may  remain." — Heb.  xii.  27   128 

X.— KEEP  THE  COMMANDMENTS. 

"  But  if  thou  wilt  enter  into  life,  keep  the  command- 
ments."— Matt.  xix.  17   14G 

XL— IDOLS. 

"  Little  children,  keep  yourselves  from  idols." — 1  John 
V.  21   164 

XII.— THE  EXAMPLE  OF  THE  SAINTS. 

"All  my  delight  is  upon  the  saints  that  are  in  the 
enrth,  and  upon  such  as  excel  in  virtue." — Ps.  xvi. 
3.    (Prayer  Book  Version.)   185 

XIII.— THE  WORK  OP  THE  FEW  AND  OF  THE  MANY. 
"By  faith."— Heb.  xi.  4   202 


Contents.  xi 

SERMON  PAGE 

XIV.— IDEALS  OP  NATIONS. 

"  Keep,  therefore,  and  do  them  ;  for  this  is  your  wis- 
dom and  your  understanding  in  the  sight  of  the 
nations,  which  shall  hear  all  tliese  statutes,  and  say, 
surely  this  great  nation  is  a  wise  and  understand- 
ing people." — Deut.  iv.  6    219 

ADDRESS 

I.— MODERN  EDUCATION  :  ITS  SPHERE  AND  ITS 

AIMS  236 

II.— THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OP  THE  ATONE- 
MENT  2-i9 

III.  — THE  GROUNDS  OP  CHRISTIAN  UNITY   269 

IV.  — TEMPERANCE  ADDRESS   277 

LECTURE 

I.— DANTE   295 


II.— FAREWELL  THOUGHTS  ON  AMERICA. 


328 


SERMON  I 


Delivered  at  the  Cathedral,  Quebec,  Sept.  14,  1885. 


€\^vi^V^  tmon  from  ti^e  LiUejs  and 


"  Therefore  I  say  unto  you,  Take  no  thought  for  your  life  what 
ye  shall  eat  or  what  ye  shall  drink ;  nor  yet  for  your  body  what  ye 
shall  put  on.  Is  not  the  life  more  than  meat,  and  the  body  than 
raiment  ?  " — Matt.  vi.  25. 

I  HAVE  chosen  these  words  for  my  text,  only  because 
they  form  part  of  the  Gospel  for  the  day. 

1.  You  all  know,  I  trust,  almost  by  heart,  that  lovely 
and  rhythmic  passage  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount. 
You  are  also  doubtless  aware  that  the  words,  "  take 
no  thought,"  did  not,  when  the  Bible  was  translated, 
mean  as  they  now  mean — "  be  wholly  indifferent  to," 
"  never  cast  a  thought  upon  " — but  that  they  meant,  as 
in  our  admirable  Eevised  Version,  "  be  not  anxious," 
"  be  not  over-careful  about."  To  take  no  thought  for 
the  morrow  would,  in  the  present  sense  of  the  phrase,  be 
at  once  impracticable  and  immoral  ;  it  would  be  as  much 
against  the  precepts  of  the  Old  as  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment ;  it  would  be  contrary  to  the  clear  practice  both  of 
1 


2    Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows. 

our  Lord  and  His  Apostles.  The  passage  in  past  ages 
was  often  abused  into  an  excuse  for  worthless  idleness, 
for  slothful  self-indulgence,  for  pernicious  mendicancy. 
The  perversion  was  inexcusable.  No  man  has  any 
right  to  liye  on  the  toil  of  his  neighbors  ;  no  man  has  a 
right  to  be  a  useless  burden  on  others  ;  no  man,  unless 
he  be  utterly  base,  will  sit  down  at  the  feast  of  life,  and 
meanly  rise  up  and  go  away,  without  paying  the  reckon- 
ing. I  need  hardly  pause  to  correct  this  abuse.  I  trust 
that  all  of  us,  of  every  rank,  of  every  age,  have  learnt 
the  dignity  of  work,  the  innocence  of  work,  the  holiness 
of  work,  the  happiness  of  work.  I  trust  that  the  very 
poorest  person  here  present  has  a  healthy  scorn  for  the 
unworthy  indolence  of  the  drunkard,  the  idler,  and  the 
tramp.  I  trust  that  the  most  ignorant  has  risen  above 
the  wilful  error  of  those  who  choose  to  think  that  these 
words  abrogated  the  primary  law  of  Eden,  "If  a  man 
will  not  work,  neither  shall  he  eat ; "  or  nullified  the 
richest  promise  of  futurity,  "Now  that  thy  work  is 
over,  enter  into  thy  rest."  The  idler  and  the  sluggard 
have  no  right  either  to  heaven  or  to  earth. 

3.  But  while  we  thus  guard  this  passage  from  a 
wrong  meaning,  let  us  be  very  careful  that  we  do  not 
rob  it  of  all  meaning.  There  is  perhaps  no  part  of 
Scripture  which  we  are  more  tempted  to  praise,  while 
we  scarcely  even  attempt  to  practise,  than  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount.  It  is  so  transcendent ;  so  ideally  noble  ; 
it  is  so  unspeakably  superior  to  the  prudential  ego- 
tisms of  worldly  wisdom.  It  comes  to  us  so  completely 
as  a  melody  out  of  a  better  and  purer  world,  that  we 
are  too  apt  to  admire  and  to  forget  it ;  to  glorify  it  as  a 
picture  instead  of  using  it  as  a  chart.   After  dwelling  on 


Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows.  3 

its  music  and  its  poetry,  we  carefully  proceed  to  explain 
it  all  away.  "  Take  no  thought,"  "  Be  not  anxious : " 
strange  exhortation  !  How  many  nominal  Christians 
even  pretend  to  follow  it  !  Go  forth  into  the  roaring, 
surging  streets  of  any  of  our  great  cities,  and  how  many 
are  there  of  these  careworn  myriads,  except  here  and 
there  some  happy  boy  or  girl,  who  are  not  full  of  a  rest- 
less and  devouring  anxiety  about  the  concerns  of  this 
life — of  this  brief  day,  which,  in  an  hour  or  two,  shall 
plunge  into  irrevocable  night  ?  They  know  that,  at  the 
best,  they  have  but  a  few  years  to  live,  and  those  full  of 
sorrow  ;  yet  they  are  madly  absorbed  in  the  desire  to 
gain  things  which,  even  for  this  brief  space,  cannot  sat- 
isfy. They  are  all  madly  absorbed  in  chasing  bubbles,  in 
weaving  spiders'  webs,  hewing  broken  cisterns,  giving 
their  labors  to  the  caterpillar — bewildered  by  the  very 
intensity  of  their  desire  to  win  that  which  does  not  and 
cannot  profit,  even  for  the  brief  span  and  ever-deepening 
twilight  of  these  our  saddened  days.  Yes,  and  they 
will  maintain  it  to  you,  that  so  it  ought  to  be ;  that  in 
this — to  them — unintelligible  world,  they  could  not 
possibly  get  on  without  dubious  dealing  ;  that  (as  they 
phrase  it)  "  business  is  business  ;  "  that  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  is  too  romantic,  too  angelical,  for  the  ware- 
house and  the  street ;  and  that  the  heaven,  which  is  so 
near  to  us,  since  we  all  may  enter  it,  is  impossibly  far 
away,  because  so  very  few  of  us  do.  And  thus  the  voice 
— the  human  voice — the  still  small  voice  of  Jesus  on  the 
hill — becomes  to  us  but  like  the  half-remembered  echo 
of  music  out  of  some  heavenly  dream.  We  visit  the 
scenes  of  the  Saviour's  earthly  life.  We  stand,  as  I  have 
stood,  on  the  very  spot  where  the  words  were  uttered. 


4    Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows. 

The  fowls  of  the  air  still  fly  around  us,  as  when  He  was 
there  ;  the  roller-bird  still  flashes,  like  a  living  sapphire, 
through  the  flowering  oleanders ;  the  kingfisher  still 
keenly  watches  the  water  from  the  plumed  reeds  beside 
the  stream  ;  the  white  wings  of  the  pelicans  still  ripple 
the  azure  crystal  of  the  lake  ;  the  eagle  still  soars  overhead 
in  the  transparent  air ;  and  underfoot  the  flowers,  still 
in  their  vernal  bloom,  surpass  Solomon  in  all  his  glory  ; 
the  pastures  are  still  brilliant  with  the  golden  amaryllis  ; 
the  scarlet  anemones  still  glow  like  flame  amid  the 
springing  corn  ;  the  lilies  still  breathe  forth  their  deli- 
cate incense  ;  the  anthers  of  the  crocus  still  bloom  with 
vegetable  gold.  Ah,  yes !  the  fair  world  is  unaltered ; 
the  sky  is  there,  the  hill  is  there,  the  lake  is  there,  the 
flowers  are  there,  the  birds  are  there,  and  Hermon  still 
upheaves  his  shining  shoulder  into  the  blue  air,  and  the 
farther  snows  of  Lebanon  are  still  crimson  with  the 
setting  sun  ; — but  where  is  He  ?  To  many  of  you,  my 
brethren,  if  you  will  confess  the  truth,  has  not  that  aw- 
ful, that  gracious  figure  of  the  Son  of  man,  seated  upon 
the  mountain  slope,  faded  away  into  a  sea  of  darkness  ? 
Does  not  His  voice  sound  to  you  like  the  dim-remem- 
bered story  out  of  lialf-legendary  days  ? 

3.  Alas  !  my  friends,  and  why  is  this  ?  Why  has  Christ 
seemed  to  vanish  so  far  away  ?  Why  to  so  many  is  He  a 
dead  Christ,  not  a  living  Christ  ?  Is  it  not  chiefly  because 
the  world  is  ever  with  us  ?  because  it  has  got  thoroughly 
into  our  hearts  ?  because  "getting  and  spending  we  lay 
waste  our  powers  ?  "  Are  we  not  ever,  and  almost  ex- 
clusively, thinking  of  this  world  ?  are  we  not  mastered  by 
the  scrambling  selfishness,  and  eager  greed  of  our  mere 
animal  and  earthly  instincts  ?    How  many  of  us  rise, 


Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows.  5 


and  how  often  even  for  a  single  day,  out  of  the  little 
shivering  egotism  of  our  personal  opinions  and  personal 
desires  ?  Whence  has  this  blight  of  unreality  fallen  so 
densely  over  the  fair  fields  of  Gospel  teaching  ?  Is  it  not 
from  the  sensual  elements  of  artificial  life  which  have 
blackened  the  air  of  the  heaven  which  we  have  suffered 
it  to  obliterate  ?  And  this  is  partly  due  to  the  fact  that 
we  are  so  dead  to  nature.  For  the  voice  of  nature  is 
none  other  than  the  voice  of  God.  Our  Lord  Himself 
tried  to  teach  us  that  God,  of  whom  we  speak  as  so  far 
and  so  silent,  is  very  near,  and  is  speaking  to  us  all  day 
long.  The  word  is  very  nigh  thee — even  in  thy  mouth 
and  in  thy  heart.  We  think  ourselves  very  pious,  if, 
with  narrow  literalism  and  stupid  superstition,  we  pro- 
fess to  worship  the  words  of  holy  books  written  hun- 
dreds of  years  ago,  as  though  they  were  the  only  voice 
in  which  God  ever  had  spoken  or  could  speak  to  us ; 
and  these  books  we  too  often  use  to  show  the  sins  and 
heresies  of  our  neighbors ;  and  all  the  while  we  lose  the 
■whole  significance  of  our  Saviour's  lessons  from  that 
other  book  of  God  whose  secret  lies  ever  open  to  the  eyes 
which  will  read  it.  The  reason  why  we  understand  great 
parts  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  even  worse  than  we 
understand  most  parts  of  Scripture,  is  because  they  are 
full  of  nature  and  natural  images.  Men  of  the  world, 
men  "who  are  earthly  and  sensual,  men  of  vulgar  and 
corroded  hearts,  "men  full  of  meat  whom  most  God's 
heart  abhors,"  smile,  with  dull  superiority,  at  lessons 
drawn  from  such  things  as  lilies  and  sparrows. 

"  A  primrose  by  a  river's  brim 
A  yellow  primrose  was  to  him — 
And  it  was  nothing  more."  , 


6    Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows, 

And  thus  they  realize  the  truth  of  the  apprehension 
that  a  land  which  practically  becomes  to  men  without 
birds  and  without  flowers,  becomes  also  a  land  with- 
out prayers,  without  angels,  and  Avithout  songs  :  a 
crowd  of  huge,  material,  godless  cities;  a  dull,  dead 
blank  of  business  and  of  selfishness,  of  mammon  and  of 
lust. 

4.  And  yet,  in  that  very  book  which  we  profess  to  be- 
lieve, and  by  which  we  profess  to  be  exclusively  guided, 
exactly  in  the  two  places  where  God  is  represented  as 
speaking  most  immediately  to  man.  He  rebukes  this 
stolid  blindness  and  deafness  to  His  message  in  nature. 
When,  in  the  Book  of  Job,  "  God  answered  Job  out  of 
the  whirlwind,  and  said,"  what  spake  He  of  ?  spake  He 
about  scholastic  definitions  of  religious  dogmas  ?  or 
about  the  thousands  of  petty  differences  of  opinion  that 
sow  the  seeds  of  hatred  and  of  disunion  in  Christian 
hearts  ?  or  about  any  one  of  the  isms  and  shibboleths 
of  self-righteous  churches  or  struggling  sects  ?  Look  for 
yourselves,  and  see  whether  He  spake  not  of  far  other 
things.  He  pointed  not  only  to  lightning  and  the  thun- 
der ;  not  only  to  the  stars  and  sea ;  not  only  "  to  the  arch 
of  the  day-spring  and  the  fountains  of  the  dawn ; "  not 
only  even  to  behemoth  trampling  the  forests,  and  levi- 
athan tempesting  the  seas  ;  but  also  to  the  goodly  wings 
of  the  peacock,  and  to  the  eagle  on  her  mountain-crag. 
And  when,  on  the  green  hill  by  the  lake,  Jesus,  the  Son 
of  God,  the  Word  of  God,  God  made  manifest  in  the 
flesh,  "opened  his  month  and  taught  them,  saying," 
what  taught  he  them  ?  Was  it  about  theology  ?  Was  it 
about  the  petty  verbal  distinctions  or  paltry  outward 
ceremonials  which  exacerbate  the  hearts  and  pander  to 


Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows.  7 


the  couceit  and  cleave  asunder  the  sects  of  quarrelling 
Christendom  ?  or  was  it  about  the  fowls  of  the  air  which 
neither  sow  nor  reap,  and  the  lilies  which  toil  not,  neither 
do  they  spin,  and  yet  Solomon  in  all  his  glory  was  not 
arrayed  like  one  of  these  ?  Turn  to  the  Book  of  Job — 
turn  to  the  Gospel  of  St.  Matthew — those  at  any  rate  are 
facts  which  you  can  verify  for  yourselves  ;  facts  which 
we  may  try  to  get  rid  of  if  we  may,  but  which  we  shall 
hardly  venture  to  deny. 

5.  "Why  take  ye  thought  for  raiment  ?  consider  the 
lilies."  Very  beautiful,  you  say  !  A  hermit  might  repeat 
those  words,  living  on  herbs,  in  the  desert  of  the  The- 
bais ;  but  is  it  not  (to  express  the  real  thought  of  many) 
— is  it  not  mere  "pious  extravagance,"  when  addressed 
to  us  hungry  men,  who  are  not  in  Eden,  but  toiling  with 
the  sweat  of  our  brow  for  our  daily  bread,  struggling 
and  pushing  each  other  about  in  toilsome  cities  ?  No, 
my  brethren,  it  is  not  pious  extravagance,  but,  if  you 
will  take  it  rightly,  it  is  sweet,  homely,  practical  truth. 
We  are  not  bidden  (observe)  to  do  nothing  for  ourselves  ; 
but  we  are  bidden,  while  doing  what  lies  in  ourselves, 
to  put  our  whole  trust  and  confidence  in  God.  We  must 
till  the  earth,  and  sow,  and  reap,  and  toil  ;  yet,  but  for 
God's  gift,  not  one  ear  of  com  would  grow  ;  and  in  giv- 
ing us  the  com.  He  would  fain  teach  us,  at  the  same 
time,  that  the  living  is  more  than  life,  and  the  body 
than  raiment,  and  that  man  doth  not  live  by  bread  alone, 
but  by  every  word  that  comes  out  of  the  mouth  of  God. 
God  makes  us  directly  dependent  on  His  mighty  power  ; 
but  to  show  that  His  power  is  all  love.  He  stamps  the 
gift  with  his  own  divine  seal — He  countersigns  it  with 
His  own  immediate  autograph — of  Beauty.    This  mar- 


8    Christ's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows. 

vellous  coincidence  of  beauty  and  utility,  so  that  "  the 
ornament  of  nature  is  but  another  aspect  of  her  work  ; " 
so  that,  by  a  divine  pre-established  harmony  in  our 
minds,  the  sun,  which  gives  us  light  and  heat,  gives  us 
also,  in  air  and  cloud,  the  glories  of  sapphire  and  amber, 
of  rainbow  and  of  flame ;  so  that  the  flower  which  gives 
us  fruit  may  give  us  also  "thoughts  that  do  often  lie  too 
deep  for  tears  so  that  the  water,  which  is  the  proper 
element  to  quench  the  thirst  of  man  and  beast,  is  always 
lovely,  whether  it  glimmer  in  the  dew-drop,  or  gleam  in 
the  rainbow,  or  hang  in  fleeces  of  fire  and  amethyst 
amid  the  evening  clouds ; — this  identity,  I  say,  of  use 
and  beauty,  of  ministry  and  glory,  is,  whether  as  a  veil 
or  as  a  revelation,  the  most  striking  sign  of  the  im- 
mediate presence  and  infinite  love  of  God.  And  this 
was  the  lesson — the  love  of  God  as  shown  in  the  loveli- 
ness of  his  work — which  the  Lord  meant  to  emphasize 
when  He  pointed  to  the  lilies  of  the  field.  In  pointing 
to  them  once  He  points  to  them  forever — to  the  poppy, 
robed  in  Solomonian  purple,  "  livelier  than  Melibocan, 
or  the  grain  of  Sarra  worn  by  kings,  and  heroes  old  in 
the  times  of  truce  ;  "  to  the  spring  hyacinths,  sprinkled 
like  dust  of  sapphires,  in  the  woodland  walks  ;  to  the 
daisy,  dear  type  of  humility,  with  its  pure  star  of  iniby 
and  white  and  gold;  to  the  pink  and  fragrant  snow  of 
the  apple-blossom  and  the  May  ;  to  the  primroses,  clus- 
tering in  their  green  firmament,  like  galaxies  of  stars ; 
to  the  stubborn  thistles,  bursting  into  voluptuous  purple ; 
to  the  moss  with  its  lustrous  jewelry ;  to  the  lichen  with 
its  many-colored  stains  ;  to  the  rose  of  Sharon  ;  to  the 
lily  of  the  valley  ;  to  the  soft  green  grass  ;  to  the  roll- 
ing billows  of  golden  com.   These,  in  their  humbleness, 


Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows.  9 

in  their  joyful  serenity,  in  tiieir  unimaginable  fantasies 
of  balm  and  bloom,  say  silently  to  us,  We,  like  all 
things  else,  are  God's  gift  to  you  ;  and  we  tell  you,  in 
multitudinous  voices,  that  God  is  light ;  that  God  is 
love ;  that  God  is  very  good  ;  that  He  maketh  His  sun 
to  shine  upon  the  evil  and  upon  the  good,  and  sendeth 
His  rain  upon  the  just  and  upon  the  unjust. 

And  the  only  proper  feeling  as  regards  them,  the  only 
true  way  of  realizing  the  gift  and  the  lesson  of  the  lilies 
of  the  field,  is  that  which  made  the  Swedish  botanist, 
as  he  gazed  on  the  gorse  and  heather  in  their  intertis- 
sued  glories  of  purple  and  gold,  kneel  down,  then  and 
there,  on  the  green  turf  under  the  open  day,  and  thank 
God  in  an  ecstasy  of  tears  and  joy.  And  I  do  trust 
that  this  feeling  is  not  in  all  hearts  wholly  dead.  Some- 
thing of  this  feeling  it  must  have  been,  which,  at  a 
flower  festival  where  the  rich  were  heaping  up  their 
splendid  fruits  and  costly  exotics,  made  one  little  timid 
girl  lay  humbly  on  the  altar-steps  her  poor  sweet  offering 
of  a  siagle  daisy.  It  must  have  been  something  of  this 
feeling  which  made  a  boy  carry  with  him  every  morning 
a  flower  to  his  place  of  business,  and  lay  it  beside  him 
on  his  desk,  not  telling  even  his  own  father  that  he  did 
so  because  the  flower  helped  to  keep  him  from  evil 
thoughts,  and  to  remind  him  of  the  love  of  God.  Nay, 
even  in  the  most  degraded,  the  feeling  is  not  always 
wholly  dead.  Not  long  ago  one  of  the  most  reckless 
women  in  Millbank  penitentiary  was  found  upon  her 
knees  sobbing,  and  clasping  something  to  her  breast, 
touched  to  the  heart,  as  she  had  never  been  touched 
before,  by  some  blossoms  of  the  white  flower  which  used 
to  blossom  under  her  windows,  when  the  now  depraved 


lo  Christ's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows. 

and  drunken  woman  had  been  a  sweet  and  innocent 
child.  To  these,  at  least,  the  flowers  had  carried  the 
lesson  which  they  may  have  for  us — "God  is  love;" 
and  "as  thy  day  is,  so  shall  thy  strength  be." 

6.  And  again,  "  Be  not  anxious  for  your  life  ;  what  ye 
shall  eat  or  what  ye  shall  drink."  " Behold  the  fowls  of 
air,  that  they  sow  not,  neither  do  they  reap,  and  your 
Heavenly  Father  feedeth  them."  Might  not  this  exqui- 
site illustration  have  furnished  its  own  antidote  against 
misrepresentation  ?  God  feedeth  them  ;  but  they  do 
nothing  for  themselves  ?  Why,  the  whole  joy  of  the  life 
of  the  birds  of  heaven  is  in  its  eager  industry  !  When 
you  see  the  swallow,  reflecting  the  sea-blue  light  from  its 
wings,  do  you  think  that  its  darting  hither  and  thither  is 
but  a  "flashing  sport?"  Have  you  ever  watched  the 
kestrel,  now  soaring  high  in  air,  now  wheeling  round  and 
round  in  ever-narrowing  circles,  now  facing  the  wind  in 
quivering  poise  with  its  paired  half-moon  wings,  then 
dashing  with  one  swoop  upon  its  prey  ?  Have  you  not 
all  sometimes  heard  the  sea-gulls  uttering  their  plaintive 
wail,  as,  with  the  slow  waft  of  their  white  wings,  they 
hover  above  the  surge  ?  Or  the  gannet,  hurling  itself 
down  like  a  thunderbolt  from  its  perpendicular  height, 
to  strike  some  fish  which  its  keen  eye  sees  glittering  deep 
under  the  waves  ?  Or,  if  you  have  not  seen  these  fair 
creatures  of  God,  you  may  at  least  learn  of  the  pigeons, 
with  the  lustre  as  of  amethyst  embathed  in  emerald  on 
their  shining  necks,  as  they  seek  the  food  which  man's 
kindness  gives  them  ;  or  the  numberless  city  spar- 
rows, humblest  and  most  despised  of  God's  creatures,  of 
which  yet  not  one  falleth  to  the  ground  without  our 
Father's  will  ?   Did  Jesus  then  point  to  the  birds  of 


Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows.  1 1 

the  air  as  though  they  set  us  an  example  of  greedy  de- 
pendence, or  of  lazy  sloth  ?  Nay,  not  so.  That  which 
He  giveth  them  they  gather ;  He  openeth  His  hand, 
and  they,  unanxious  about  the  morrow,  guided  by  un- 
reflecting instinct,  toiling  for  what  God  gives,  are  filled 
with  food.*  The  simplicity  of  a  beautiful  and  trustful 
instinct  looks  not  in  vain  to  God.  "  That  little  fel- 
low," said  Luther,  of  a  bird  going  to  roost,  "has 
chosen  his  shelter,  and  is  quietly  rocking  himself  to 
sleep  without  a  care  for  to-morrow's  lodging,  calmly 
holding  on  to  his  little  twig,  and  leaving  God  to  think 
for  him."  And  thus,  what  Christ  would  tell  us  is  that 
the  flowers,  by  the  divine  hieroglyphics  of  their  ephem- 
eral beauty,  teach  us  that  God  loves  us ;  and  the  birds, 
by  their  divinely  implanted  instinct  of  strenuous  trust, 
in  every  varying  gleam  upon  their  plumage,  in  every 
beat  of  their  quivering  wings,  in  every  warbled  melody 
of  their  natural  joy,  say  to  us,  "  Fear  not ;  be  not  anx- 
ious ;  your  Heavenly  Father  feedeth  us ;  and  are  not  ye 
of  much  more  value  than  we  are — of  more  value  than 
many  sparrows  ?  " 

Here,  then,  are  the  lessons  of  this  passage ;  I  don't 
know  whether  you  would  call  them  the  Gospel  or  not, 
but  Christ  taught  them,  and  He,  I  suppose,  knew  bet- 
ter than  modem  Pharisees.  Do  your  work  in  quiet- 
ness and  confidence  ;  do  your  duty  without  anxiety ; 
and  He  who,  even  in  the  desert,  spreads  His  table  for 
the  birds,  and  He  who  clothes  the  flowers  in  a  vesture 
more  gorgeous  than  the  crimson  robes  of  kings,  will 
feed  and  clothe  you.    That  trust  which  unconsciously 


*  See  Martineau,  Hov/rs  of  Thought, 


1 2  Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows. 

God's  humbler  creatures  show,  that  do  ye  show  reflect- 
ingly  and  consciously.  Trast  in  God  for  these  lower 
things,  because  there  are  higher  things  which  he  has 
given  and  will  give  to  you.  Do  not  degrade  and  drag 
down  your  life  by  the  spirit  of  mean,  selfish,  grudging, 
untrustful  accumulation.  If  you  seek  first  the  king- 
dom of  God,  ail  these  other  things  shall  be  added  unto 
you.  There  is  nothing  wrong  in  your  trade,  and  your 
merchandise,  and  your  daily  work  to  earn  your  own 
living ;  so  far  from  being  a  rival  business  to  these,  the 
seeking  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  a  divine  law, 
which  should  regulate,  a  divine  temper  which  should 
pervade  and  transfigure  them.  Only  for  the  sake  of 
your  own  souls,  for  the  sake  of  all  that  makes  life  life, 
for  the  sake  alike  of  your  temporal  and  eternal  happi- 
ness, do  not  seek  the  dross  of  eurth  more,  and  love  it 
better  than  the  gold  of  heaven.  Let  conscience  and 
faith  enter  into  every  necessary  act  of  daily  life.  Learn 
to  discriminate  the  transcendent.  Learn  to  feel  habitu- 
ally that  the  life,  the  true  life,  the  spiritual  life  is  more 
than  food,  and  the  body  than  raiment.  Let  justice, 
goodness,  kindness,  purity  be  our  aim,  not  the  selfish 
scramble  of  scheming  competition,  not  the  brutal  appe- 
tencies of  sensual  desire.  Do  not  let  your  daily  neces- 
sities blunt  the  edge  of  your  ideal  aspirations.  Do  not 
sink  into  mere  money-making  machines.  Man  lives, 
indeed,  by  bread  ;  but,  oh  !  remember  that  he  doth  not 
live  by  bread  alone.  Two  classes  of  interests  daily 
appeal  to  us  with  intense  persistence — the  lower  and  the 
higher ;  the  earthly  and  the  divine  ;  those  of  the  ani- 
mal and  those  of  the  spiritual  nature.  On  the  one  side 
money,  self-importance,  power,  comfort,  pleasure,  grasp 


Christ 's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows.  1 3 


us  with  the  attraction  of  their  nearness,  and  of  their 
coarse  reality  ;  on  the  other  hand,  calling  to  us  as  with 
sweet,  far  voices  from  the  invisible  world,  are  grace, 
contentment,  trust,  duty,  thankfulness  for  undeserved 
mercies,  a  desire  to  give  rather  than  to  receive,  the  holy 
readiness  to  spend  and  be  spent  for  the  good  of  others, 
not  our  own. 

So  shall  we  indeed  have  learned  the  meaning  of 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  the  lesson  which — that  we 
might  learn  it  the  better,  that  it  might  the  more  deeply 
be  graved  upon  our  memory,  that  it  might  the  more 
constantly  be  brought  to  our  recollection — the  Lord  of 
our  souls  wrote  in  plainest  letters  on  the  Book  of  the 
Universe,  and  attached  to  the  commonest  sights  and 
sounds  of  our  daily  life.  He  wrote  the  strong,  neces- 
sary, simple  lesson,  and  he  illuminated  with  letters  of 
light  and  loveliness  the  missal  in  which  it  was  written 
down.  If  we  carry  it  with  us,  the  very  world  we  live 
on,  the  very  ground  we  tread,  the  very  air  we  breathe 
will  be  beautiful  and  vocal  with  heavenly  messages,  and 

"  Every  bird  that  sings. 
And  every  flower  that  stars  the  elastic  sod, 
And  every  breath  the  radiant  summer  brings 
To  the  pure  spirit,  be  a  word  of  God." 

It  will  bid  us  thank  God  for  our  creation,  preservation, 
and  all  the  blessings  of  this  life  ;  it  will  bid  us  thank 
Him  with  yet  more  heartfelt  gratitude  for  our  redemp- 
tion, for  our  immortality;  for  Him  who  said,  "I  am 
the  bread  of  life ; "  for  Him  who  promised,  "  He  that 
Cometh  to  me  shall  never  hunger,  and  he  that  believeth 
on  me  shall  never  thirst."    And  that  message  will  fur- 


14  Christ's  Lesson  from  Lilies  and  Sparrows. 

ther  say  to  us,  "  To  God,  who  gives  us  all,  shall  we  give 
nothing  ?  To  Him,  the  Lord  of  our  life,  shall  we  have 
nothing  to  offer  when  death  comes  but  'the  dust  of  our 
mortal  bodies  and  the  shipwreck  of  immortal  souls  ? '  " 
Ah !  let  us  strive  more  perfectly  to  learn  this  lesson, 
which  Christ  taught  from  the  lilies  and  the  sparrows, 
to  those  poor,  suffering,  hungry,  thirsty  multitudes,  in 
His  first  great  sermon — His  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  So 
shall  we  rise  above  the  fret  and  faithlessness  of  worldly 
anxieties,  and  the  meanness  of  all  those  aims  which  are 
earthy,  of  earth  alone.  So  shall  we  learn  His  sweet  and 
consoling  lesson  :  "  Be  not  anxious  about  your  life, 
what  ye  shall  eat  or  what  ye  shall  drink,  nor  yet  for 
your  body  what  ye  shall  put  on.  Is  not  the  life  more 
than  meat,  and  the  body  than  raiment  ?  Seek  ye  first 
the  kingdom  of  God,  and  His  righteousness,  and  all 
these  things  shall  be  added  unto  you." 


SERMON  II. 

Deutered  in  St.  Geoege's,  Montreal,  Sept.  19,  1885. 


Wherefore  he  saith,  "Awake  thou  that  sleepest."— Eph,  v.  14. 

In  the  great  mediaeyal  allegory,  he  who,  having  fallen 
away  from  innocence  into  sin,  desires,  with  all  his 
heart,  to  struggle  back  from  sin  to  forgiveness,  must 
climb  up  a  steep  hill  to  a  narrow  wicket-gate.  That 
wicket-gate  is  approached  by  three  steps  : — a  step  of 
whitest  marble,  a  step  of  dark  and  riven  purple,  a  step 
of  burning  red.  They  are  meant  to  shadow  forth  the 
step  of  sincerity,  the  step  of  contrition,  and  the  step  of 
love.  Have  any  of  us  ever  seriously  tried  to  take  our 
stand  upon  that  lowest  step — the  step  of  perfect  sin- 
cerity— the  step  so  white  that  it  mirrors  the  whole 
man  ? 

No  eye  but  a  man's  own  can  gaze,  almost  as  with  the 
eye  of  God,  on  the  unveiled  human  heart.  But  when 
men's  eyes  are  opened,  and  they  have  been  brought  to 
look  fairly  and  fully  on  themselves  ;  when  they  have 
entered  that  awful  solitude  in  which  the  soul  is  alone 
with  God ;  when  they  have  been  forced,  or  have  brought 


i6 


Awakenme^it. 


themselves,  to  connect  their  own  personality  with  the 
shame  and  guilt  of  sin ;  when  the  voluble  spirit  of  excuse 
is  at  last  dumb  ; — what  follows  ? 

I  know  no  word  which  will  describe  the  result  of  self- 
revelation  so  briefly  as  Awakenment. 

The  ordinary  moral  and  spiritual  condition  of  most 
men,  in  their  common  life,  can  only  be  pictured  by  the 
metaphor  of  sleep.  There  are  many  degrees  and  varie- 
ties of  this  spiritual  sleep.  There  is  a  sleep  of  human 
feebleness,  which  is  a  venial,  if  not  an  inevitable  imper- 
fection, and  of  which  our  Lord  said  to  those  slumbering 
Apostles,  "The  spirit  indeed  is  willing,  but  the  flesh 
is  weak."  Far  deeper  and  worse  is  the  sleep  of  those 
who,  though  they  are  not  guilty  of  glaring  and  flagrant 
sin,  are  yet  absorbed  in  the  worldly  life  ;  given  up  to 
dissipations  and  trivialities  ;  losing,  for  the  sake  of  liv- 
ing, all  that  constitutes  a  true  life.  Deepest  and  dead- 
liest of  all — like  the  sleep  of  a  man  in  a  burning  house — 
is  the  slumber  of  those  who  have  sold  themselves  to  do 
evil ;  who  work  all  uncleanness  with  greediness ;  who 
have  steeped  themselves  up  to  the  lips  in  the  grossness 
of  sensualism  ;  who  have  given  themselves  over  to  a  life 
of  falsehood,  or  avarice,  or  drink,  or  crime.  But  so 
common  is  this  sleep  in  one  or  other  of  its  forms,  that 
the  Scripture  is  constantly  striving  to  arouse  men  from 
its  fatal  torpor. 

But,  my  brethren,  the  thought  which  I  wish  to  leave 
with  your  consciences  this  morning  is,  that,  whether 
we  are  waking  or  sleeping  now,  our  sleep  cannot  and 
will  not  last  forever.  In  vain  you  fold  your  hands — in 
vain  you  say  a  little  more  sleep,  a  little  more  slumber  : 
you  must  be  awakened.    Either  in  this  world  or  the 


Awakenment. 


17 


next  must  come  the  awakenment  whicli  results  from  see- 
ing ourselves  as  we  are.  It  comes  to  those  who,  though 
they  are  often  drowsy,  are  yet  waiting  for  their  Lord. 
It  comes  to  those  who  are  living  the  empty  life  of  selfish 
worldliness ;  it  comes,  worst  of  all,  to  the  hardened, 
reckless  sinner,  who  in  a  moment,  in  the  twinkling  of 
an  eye,  shall  some  day  be  forced  to  judge  himself  in  the 
light  of  God,  and  to  see  his  heart  as  it  is  in  the  view  of 
heaven.  Think  of  it ;— to  each  one  of  us — either  by 
our  repentance,  or  with  penal  retribution — either  in 
this  world  or  in  the  world  hereafter — awakenment  will 
come. 

It  comes  in  very  different  ways.  The  wind  blowetli 
where  it  listeth,  and  thou  canst  not  tell  whence  it 
Cometh,  nor  whither  it  goeth.  "There  are  those  to 
whom  it  comes  in  storms  and  tempests  ;  there  are  those 
whom  it  has  summoned  in  hours  of  revelry  and  idle 
vanity  ;  there  are  those  who  have  heard  its  still  small 
voice  in  scenes  of  leisure  and  placid  contentment ; 
there  are  others,  again,  to  whom  it  has  come  during 
seasons  of  sorrow  and  affliction,  and  to  whom  tears  have 
been  the  softening  showers  which  caused  the  seed  of 
heaven  to  spring  up  and  take  root  in  the  human  heart."  * 
But  when  it  comes  penally,  and  in  the  way  of  catas- 
trophe, it  is  then  an  awful  moment.  It  is  as  though 
we  had  long  wandered  in  the  wintry  darkness,  and  sud- 
denly a  flash  of  lightning  reveals  to  us  that  chasms 
yawn  on  every  side  of  us  ;  or  the  dim  dawn  comes,  and 
as  we  look  back,  we  see  that  for  the  long  hours  of  dark- 
ness our  footsteps  have  been  along  the  very  edge  of  an 
abyss. 


2 


*  Sir  Walter  Scott. 


i8 


Awakenment. 


My  friends,  it  is  only  with  a  shudder  that  even  the 
saint  of  God  can  look  into  the  abysmal  deeps  of  his  own 
personality.  When  a  man's  eyes  are  opened  he  recog- 
nizes in  his  faithless  and  wilful  heart  a  capacity  for 
every  form  of  crime.  See  how  that  awakenment  made 
even  David  cry  with  anguish  :  "  Behold  !  I  was  shapen 
in  iniquity,  and  in  sin  did  my  mother  conceive  me ; " 
and  Job  :  "  Though  I  wash  me  with  snow-water,  and 
make  myself  never  so  clean ;  yet  thou  shalt  plunge  me 
in  the  ditch,  so  that  my  own  clothes  shall  abhor  me ; " 
and  Peter  :  "Depart  from  me,  for  I  am  a  sinful  man,  oh 
Lord  ! ''  and  St.  Paul :  "Wretched  man  that  I  am,  who 
shall  deliver  me  from  the  body  of  this  death  ?  "  and  St. 
Augustine:  "Liberate  me  from  a  bad  man — myself;" 
and  St.  Theresa :  "  Seeing  my  own  soul  in  a  vision,  it 
looked  to  me  as  though  it  were  covered  with  spots  of 
leprosy ;  and  Luther  :  "Oh  my  sins,  my  sins  ! "  It  was 
this  that  made  the  great  and  eloquent  Chancellor  of 
Paris,  Jean  Gerson,  gather  the  little  children  round 
him  and  bid  them  pray  :  "  Lord,  have  mercy  on  thy 
poor  servant,  Jean  Gerson."  It  made  Bunyan — until, 
as  he  says,  "  The  number  got  beyond  him  " — envy  even 
the  lowest  of  God's  creatures,  because  they  had  not  done 
wrong.    It  was  this  which  wrung  from  Cowper  the  cry: 

"  We  perished  each  alone  ; 
But  I  beneath  a  rougher  sea, 
And  whelmed  in  deeper  gulfs  than  he." 

It  was  this  which  caused  the  holy  martyr,  Bradford,  to 
exclaim,  pointing  to  a  criminal  being  led  to  execution, 
"There,  but  for  the  grace  of  God,  goes  John  Bradford." 
It  was  this  dictated  the  words  of  Ed.  Irving  :  "  When  I 


Awakenment. 


19 


imagine  my  poor  soul,  possessed  with  the  memory  of  its 
misdeeds,  exposed  to  the  scorching  eye  of  my  Maker,  I 
shriek  and  shiver  with  mortal  apprehension.  And  when 
I  fancy  the  myriads  of  men,  all  standing  there  explored 
and  known,  I  seem  to  hear  their  shiverings  like  the 
aspen  leaves  in  the  still  evenings  of  autumn."  Such  are 
the  confessions  of  the  holiest,  and  so  ignorant  is  the 
world  of  the  depth  of  contrition  with  which  the  true 
soul  is  broken  when  it  sees  its  own  sinfulness,  that  it  has 
utterly  mistaken  these  confessions,  and  has  chosen  to 
interpret  them  as  though  they  were  the  proof  of  vileness 
in  comparison  with  other  men,  the  shrinking  and  sen- 
sitive self-reproach  of  souls  that  desired  only  to  be  pure 
as  He  is  pure  who  "  chargeth  even  His  angels  with  folly, 
and  in  whose  sight  the  very  heavens  are  not  clean." 

But  oh  !  if  awakenment  have  its  awfulness  even  for 
those  who  know  that  their  souls  are  reconciled — who 
feel  that,  whatever  they  may  once  have  been,  they  are 
now  washed,  and  cleansed,  and  justified,  what  must  it  be 
to  the  man,  who,  in  spite  of  the  self -revelation,  still 
loves,  still  refuses  to  forsake  his  sins  ?  It  is  a  tremen- 
dous moment  which  first  reveals  to  a  man  that  he  too  is 
hitherto  a  lost  soul.  A  swimmer  has  struck  out  far  into 
the  summer  wave,  and,  seeking  to  swim  back  to  shore, 
suddenly  realizes  that  he  is  helpless  in  the  grasp  of  the 
irresistible  tide ;  boys  have  rowed  their  boat  down  the 
river,  and  suddenly  the  white  breakers  gleam  round 
them,  and  they  perceive  that  they  are  being  swept  over 
the  harbor  bar  into  the  sea  ;  the  crew  of  a  ship  which  is 
sailing  through  dense  fogs,  suddenly  hear  the  sound  of 
billows  on  an  iron  shore,  and,  in  a  moment's  lifting  of 
the  mist,  see  rising  before  them  a  precipice  of  rock — 


20 


Awakenment. 


does  not  the  blood  of  these  curdle  with  fear,  do  not  the 
hearts  of  these  throb  with  horror  at  the  sudden,  awful 
peril  ?  Hardly,  I  think,  with  such  horror  as  when  a 
man  is  first  startled  into  the  awakening  recognition  of 
his  own  moral  catastrophe,  and  spiritual  ruin ;  when, 
amid  the  bitter  mocking  of  the  fiends  who  have  lured 
him  to  his  destruction,  he  sees  at  last  that  the  laws 
which  he  has  been  defying,  act,  as  he  has  been  always 
warned  that  they  would  act,  with  mechanical  certainty 
and  irretrievable  precision  ;  that  he  too  is  a  wreck,  a 
castaway,  flung  on  the  weltering  waves  of  time,  or 
stranded  on  the  naked  shore  of  eternity.  What  must  be 
the  feelings  of  a  man  who  for  twenty,  thirty,  forty,  fifty 
years  has  been  outwardly  honest  and  moral,  but  who, 
suddenly  grasped  by  the  accelerating  impetus  of  sins 
secretly  cherished,  suddenly  forced  to  own  to  the  bond 
to  which  he  has  set  his  own  seal,  commits  a  crime,  and 
is  forced  to  sit  down  amid  the  ruins  of  his  life  ?  With 
what  eye  does  he  gaze  on  the  conflagration  of  his  hopes, 
which,  as  it  reduces  his  future  to  a  blackened  ruin, 
flings  a  hideous  glare  of  revelation  upon  his  past  ?  "In 
the  remarks  which  you  addressed  to  the  Court,"  said  an 
English  Judge  in  passing  the  sentence  of  penal  servitude 
on  the  young,  able,  popular  member  of  Parliament  who 
stood  before  him  as  a  cheat  and  a  forger  in  the  felon's 
dock,  "you  said  that  your  whole  life  had  been  one  seri- 
ous and  fatal  mistake.  I  can  easily  believe  it.  The 
mistake" — (hear  it,  young  men!)  —  "consisted  in  the 
absence  of  that  perfect  rectitude  of  intention,  and  of 
that  well-regulated  mind,  which  are  the  only  safe  guides 
in  human  life.  The  man  who  first  deviates  from  recti- 
tude, takes  the  first  step  toward  a  precipice,  and  he 


Awakenment. 


21 


soon  finds  that  to  stand  still  is  impossible,  that  to  retreat 
would  be  ruin,  and  that  to  advance  is  destruction." 

Ah  !  my  brethren,  let  no  man  say  to  himself  super- 
ciliously in  his  Pharisaic  heart,  "What  has  all  this 
to  do  with  me  ?  I  am  not  an  extortioner,  unclean, 
an  adulterer,  as  other  men  are,  or  even  as  these 
publicans."  Ye  who  know  yourselves,  will  know  that, 
but  for  the  grace  of  God,  continually  sought,  none  of 
us  is  safe  at  any  time,  none  of  us  is  safe  from  any  thing. 
If,  indeed,  you  be  a  child  of  God  the  golden  chain  which 
holds  you  is  safe  in  His  hand ;  but  if  your  trust  be 
merely  in  honor  and  worldly  expediency,  your  passions 
are  but  bound  with  a  chain  of  flowers  which  one  tiger's 
leap  may  burst.  The  examples  I  have  given  apply  at 
least  to  each  one  of  you  who  is  living  a  life  of  sin.  If 
you  be  growing  fond  of  any  one  besetting  sin  ;  if  you  are 
laying  waste  the  inner  sanctities  of  your  moral  nature ;  if 
you  are  only  depending  on  "the  unspiritual  God  circum- 
stance ;  "  if  you  are  worshipping  success  or  money,  you 
may  yet  experience  that  he  that  doeth  sin  is  the  servant 
of  sin,  and  that  to  become  amenable  to  stern  human 
laws  may  be  a  thing  unspeakably  less  terrible  than  to  be 
ground  to  powder  by  those  divine  laws,  of  which  the 
human  are  but  an  imperfect  expression.  When  nothing 
of  the  sin  is  left  but  the  ruin  it  has  wrought ;  when 
"  the  Furies  begin  to  take  their  seat  upon  the  midnight 
pillow;"  when  a  man  is  forced  to  face  the  fact  that  he 
too  belongs  to  the  awful  failures  and  tremendous  ex- 
amples which  point  to  the  world's  experience  ;  when 
he  realizes  that  the  life,  the  one,  the  beautiful  life  which 
God  gave  him — with  its  innocent  childhood  and  golden 
youth,  and  priceless  opportunities —has  been  lost  and 


22 


Awakenment. 


wasted  ;  that  he  has  been  an  utter  and  inexcusable  fool; 
that  he  has  but  added  strength  to  the  curse  of  evil  in  the 
world  ;  that  it  had  been  better  for  him,  at  this  moment, 
if,  with  a  millstone  round  his  neck,  he  were  lying  in  the 
depths  of  the  sea  ;  yea,  better  for  him  if  he  had  not 
been  born  ;  then,  in  that  moment,  whether  it  be  on  the 
glaring  stage  of  public  detection,  or  in  the  secret  sessions 
of  the  heart,  the  man  must  know  what  Christ  meant  by 
the  outer  darkness,  by  the  worm  that  dieth  not,  and  the 
fire  that  is  not  quenched. 

And  yet  it  is  a  most  blessed  thing  for  any  man  if  that 
awakenment — so  he  neglect  it  not — comes  during  life  ; 
yea,  even  if  it  comes,  as  it  comes  sometimes,  in  the 
very  hour  of  death.  To  trust,  indeed,  to  this  is  to  walk 
over  a  chasm  on  a  razor's  edge.  A  great  writer  of  fic- 
tion, describing  the  death  of  a  young  nobleman  who  has 
been  shot  in  a  duel  after  a  life  of  silly  dissipation,  de- 
scribes the  agonizing  reflection  which  came  too  late, 
that  he  might  have  been  dying  happy  with  children's 
faces  round  his  bed.  The  great  poet,  seeing  in  Pur- 
gatory the  soul  of  Buonconti,  hears  from  him  that, 
dying  on  the  field  of  Campaldino,  his  last  cry  for  mercy 
was  heard,  and  as  the  Angel  of  God  took  him,  the  spirit 
of  hell  cried  out,  "  0,  thou  from  heaven,  why  dost  rob 
me  ?  Dost  thou  carry  away  the  eternal  share  of  him — 
per  una  lagrimetta — for  one  poor  tear  that  delivers  him 
from  me  ?"  And  perhaps  some  of  you  may  remember 
a  scene  in  a  great  modern  work  of  genius  where  the 
poor,  fallen,  deserted  maiden  dies  in  prison,  and  a  deep 
voice  of  the  evil  spirit,  as  he  stands  beside  her  and  hears 
the  last  fluttering  breath,  utters  "  She  is  judged  ! " — 
1st  gerichtet — ^but  even  there,  from  the  upper  air,  thrills 


Awakenment. 


23 


the  cry  as  of  an  angel,  1st  gerettet ! — "  She  is  saved ! " 
"One,"  said  the  Rabbi,  "  wins  eternal  life  after  years  of 
struggle  ;  another  obtains  it  in  one  hour,"  If  it  seems 
unjust  to  us  that  a  soul  should  be  saved  as  by  one  flash 
and  spasm  of  repentance,  our  thought  may  only  be  due 
to  our  own  gross  envy  and  ignorance.  It  is  otherwise  to 
the  larger  eyes  of  Him  to  whom  Time  and  Eternity  are 
but  one  great  "now" — to  Him  who,  on  the  cross,  turn- 
ing upon  the  dying  malefactor  the  kingly  eyes,  which 
were  beginning  already  to  be  filmed  by  death,  exclaimed, 
"  This  day  shalt  thou  be  with  me  in  Paradise."  Even 
in  the  hour  of  death,  then,  awakenment  may  come,  and 
come  effectually.  Only,  my  brethren,  remember  how 
much  more  often  death  ends — not  in  contrition,  there- 
fore not  in  repentance,  but  in  dull  torpor  or  hard 
defiance. 

"  Lord  Cardinal,  if  thou  thinkest  on  heaven's  bliss, 
Hold  up  thy  hand,  make  signal  of  thy  hope ; — 
He  dies  and  makes  no  sign  ;  0  God,  forgive  him  I  " 

But  even  when  the  conviction  of  guilt  comes  before 
the  death-bed,  if  in  some  it  produces  penitence,  there 
are  others  in  whom  it  produces  only  wretchedness,  and 
in  others  only  an  unfathomable  despair. 

Wretchedness,  as  of  him  who,  in  the  blasphemy  of 
unclean  defiance,  said,  "  Knowing  that  I  am  predestined 
to  damnation,  I  will  give  diligence  to  make  my  election 
sure."  Despair,  as  of  him  who  shrieked,  "I  have 
sinned,  in  that  I  have  betrayed  innocent  blood,"  and 
hearing  the  brutal  taunt  of  his  priestly  abettors,  "What 
is  that  to  us  ?  See  thou  to  that  !  "  departed  and  went 
away  and  hanged  himself.    The  history  of  the  Refor- 


24 


Awakenment. 


mation  produced  an  awful  example  of  such  a  man  in 
Francis  Spiera.  Conyerted  to  Protestantism,  but  mor- 
ally unchanged,  he  turned  the  grace  of  God  into  lascivi- 
ousness,  and  then,  in  fear  of  the  Inquisition,  recanted — 
first  privately,  then  publicly — the  Gospel  truths  which 
he  had  preached.  But  no  sooner  did  he  get  home  than 
he  was  seized  with  fearful  torments  of  conscience.  He 
seemed  to  hear  a  voice,  which  cried,  "  Wretch,  thou 
hast  denied  me,  depart  from  me  !  "  No  comfort  could 
reach  him ;  he  ceased  to  believe  in  prayer ;  he  died 
remorseful,  yet  hopeless.  They  who  saw  his  end  de- 
scribed it  as  Tiorrenda  desperatio,  and  one  exclaimed, 
"  If  all  the  students  of  Padua  do  not  forsake  all  their 
lectures  to  gaze  on  this  tragedy,  their  sensibilities  must 
be  exceedingly  obtuse." 

But  some  there  are  to  whom,  as  to  Dives,  there 
seems  to  come  in  this  life  no  awakenment.  Shall  we 
count  them  happy  ?  Happy — how  long  ?  Happy — till 
when  ?  You  can  appreciate  the  trembling  rapture  of 
the  awakening  in  heaven  ; — that  bursting  glory,  that 
infinite  exaltation,  that  triumph  of  peace  indescribable  ! 
What  must  be  that  other  awakening  ? — the  awakening 
of  those  who,  willingly  to  the  end,  have  broken  the  law 
of  God  ?  "  Oh  God,  they  have  deceived  me,  and  this  is 
Death  ! "  said  a  bad  English  king,  as  l^e  fell  back  and 
died.  Ah  yes,  it  is  an  awful  moment  when  the  gold 
must  drop  from  the  relaxing  hand  ;  when  no  jewelled 
star  can  hide  the  mean  heart  any  longer  ;  when 
pleasure,  which  has  become  as  loathly  as  it  is  impos- 
sible, shrivels  like  a  withered  garland  ;  when  the  gains 
of  ambition  look  as  mean  as  the  rouge  and  tinsel  of  the 
stage  under  the  dawn  !    Shall  it  not  be  as  a  luxurious 


Awakenment. 


25 


dream  wlien  a  man  waketh  to  gnawing  hunger  and 
scorching  thirst  ?  You  have  read  of  the  young  som- 
nambulist of  the  French  village,  who,  in  her  sleep,  got 
out  of  her  garret  window  upon  the  roof,  and,  in  the 
sight  of  a  silent  and  trembling  crowd,  walked  up  and 
down  the  giddy  parapet,  and  dreaming  of  a  coming 
festival — sometimes  approaching  the  edge,  sometimes 
leaving  it,  sometimes,  while  they  held  their  breath  for 
very  horror,  leaning  down  toward  the  street  below — 
kept  smiling  and  murmuring  her  gay  songs.  And  they 
were  powerless  to  help  her.  And,  of  a  sudden,  a  little 
candle  was  lit  in  an  opposite  window ;  it  flashed  upon 
her  eyes  ;  she  woke  ;  she  screamed  ;  her  awakening 
was  a  deadly  fall.  It  had  killed  her.  Alas  !  ye  who 
are  without  faith  and  without  God, — ye  to  whom  at 
this  moment  the  world  is  God, — what  are  ye  but 
sleepers  who,  in  your  slumber,  walk  to  the  edge  of  an 
abyss,  ye  too,  perhaps,  singing  and  dreaming  of  festal 
days  ?  For  what  else  is  it  than  a  dream  to  take 
shadows  for  realities  and  realities  for  shadows  ?  "When 
one  ray  of  light — one  clear  ray  out  of  God's  eternity — 
shall  smite  your  dreaming  eyes,  do  you  not  fear  that 
start,  that  tottering  over  the  edge,  that  death  ?  Is  not 
your  godless  life  pregnant  with  suicide  ? 

And  oh,  God,  that  awakening  !  Another,  not  I — 
another,  one  of  the  most  eminent  of  religious  teachers — 
shall  describe  what  it  may  be— the  terrible  moment 
when  the  Judge  speaks  and  consigns  the  soul  to  the 
jailers  till  the  debt  is  paid.  "Impossible  !  I,  a  lost 
soul  ?  I,  separated  from  hope  and  from  peace  forever  ? 
It  is  not  I  of  whom  the  J udge  so  spoke  !  There  is  a 
mistake  !   Christ !  Saviour  !  hold  my  hand  one  minute 


26 


Awakenment. 


to  explain  it :  my  name  is  Demar ;  I  am  but  Demar, 
not  Judas  !  What  !  I  a  lost  soul  ?  Impossible  !  it  shall 
not  be  so  !  And  the  poor  soul  struggles  and  wrestles 
in  the  grasp  of  the  mighty  demon  who  has  hold  of  it, 
and  whose  every  touch  is  torment.  Stop,  horrible  fiend ! 
Give  over ;  I  am  a  man,  and  not  such  as  thou  !  I  am 
not  food  for  thee,  and  sport  for  thee  !  I  have  been 
taught  religion ;  I  have  had  a  cultivated  mind  ;  I  am 
well  versed  in  science  and  art ;  I  am  a  philosopher,  a 
poet,  a  hero  ;  nay,  I  have  received  the  grace  of  redemp- 
tion ;  I  have  attended  the  sacraments  for  years — 
nothing,  nothing  which  I  have  ever  been,  which  I 
have  ever  seen,  bears  any  resemblance  to  thee.  I  defy 
thee  and  abjure  thee,  enemy  of  man.  Alas  !  poor  soul ! 
and  while  it  thus  fights  with  that  destiny  which  it  has 
brought  upon  itself,  and  those  companions  which  it  has 
chosen,  the  man's  name  perhaps  is  solemnly  chanted 
forth  on  earth.  Men  appeal  to  his  authority  ;  quote 
his  words  ;  write  his  history.  So  comprehensive,  so 
kind,  so  profound.  Oh  !  vanity  of  vanities !  what 
profiteth  it  ?    His  soul  is  lost,  oh,  ye  children  of  men  ! " 

My  brethren,  remember,  I  do  not  endorse  the  whole 
of  this  passage  as  it  stands  on  the  pages  of  Cardinal 
Newman  in  terrible  details  which  I  have  omitted.  To 
me  it  seems  mediaeval  rather  than  Scriptural ;  the 
"  Tartarian  drench  "  of  a  powerful  imagination  rather 
than  anything  which  has  been  so  revealed.  But  yet 
the  dreadful  imagery  may  serve  to  remind  you  of  un- 
speakable realities  ; — of  the  shame  of  that  awakenment 
when  sinners  call  on  the  mountains  to  fall  on  them  and 
the  rocks  to  cover  them.  Souls,  which  should  have 
entered  into  a  world  of  light,  clad  in  white  robes, 


Awakenment. 


27 


bright,  rejoicing,  glorified,  as  with  a  drift  of  angels' 
wings — souls,  for  which  all  the  golden  trumpets  should 
have  sounded  on  the  other  side,  find,  as  they  go  to 
their  own  place,  that  it  is  an  outer  darkness,  into 
which  they  must  shiver  forth  as  souls  lost,  degraded, 
stained,  ruined,  the  victims  of  the  triumph  of  the 
powers  of  evil.  At  the  very  best,  it  is  for  the  bad  man 
a  terrible  thing  "  to  die,  and  go  we  know  not  where." 
To  such  a  man, 

"  The  weariest  and  most  loathed  worldly  life 
That  age,  ache,  penury  and  imprisonment 
Can  lay  on  nature,  is  a  Paradise 
To  what  we  dream  of  death." 

My  brethren,  I  love  not  the  messages  of  terror  and 
of  gloom.  I  have  not,  indeed,  set  the  truths  of  life 
and  death  before  you  as  though  they  were  mere  dance- 
music  ;  a  lullaby  for  baby  spirits,  a  revelation  among 
the  myrtle-trees  by  night.  Be  men !  Face  these  realities ! 
You  see  what  an  awful  thing  life  is  for  all  who  are  alien- 
ated from  God ;  think  you  that  death  is  less  awful  ? 
Think  you  that  it  is  some  extreme  unction  which  will 
mechanically  set  you  free  ?  If  in  life  we  hear  so  often 
voices  as  of  shipwreck  on  a  shoreless  ocean,  what  reason 
have  we  to  believe  that  those  voices  may  not  catch  a 
tone  of  yet  more  thrilling  agony  beyond  the  grave  ? 
But  why  need  there  be  any  such  thought  of  terror  for 
any  one  of  us  ?  Has  not  Christ  died  for  us  ?  Is  not 
this  the  lesson  of  Christ's  birth  and  death,  that  he  lived 
and  died  to  save  us,  and  all  mankind  ?  He  offers  us 
peace  here,  and  peace  beyond  the  grave  ;  and  not  to  us 
only,  but  to  all  who  believe  in  His  name.    All  that  we 


28  Awakenment. 

have  to  do  is  to  trust  in  Him  ;  to  seek  him  now — now 
in  the  accepted  time ;  to  love  one  another ;  love  His 
little  ones ;  to  work  for  Him ;  to  obey  His  laws ;  to 
spread  His  kingdom.  If  happily  to  us  the  awakenment 
from  the  dream  of  sin  have  come  not  in  terror  and  as 
with  the  thunder-clap,  but  through  still  small  voices,  or 
gently  as  the  falling  dew,  let  us  try  that  those  voices  be 
heard  by  others,  and  that  their  souls  also  be  wet  with 
that  gracious  dew.  He  came  to  save  sinners  ;  He  came 
therefore  to  save  us ;  and  all  whom  He  saves — all,  all 
the  innumerable  multitude  who,  whether  their  awaken- 
ment came  here,  or  in  death,  shall  be  gathered  under  the 
span  of  that  rainbow  round  about  the  throne  in  light 
like  unto  an  emerald  ;  all,  all  of  these  when  they  awake 
after  His  likeness  shall  be  satisfied  with  it !  And  so, 
my  brethren,  let  us,  while  there  is  yet  time,  pray  both 
prayers  for  ourselves  :  "  God,  be  merciful  to  me  a  sin- 
ner;" and,  "That  it  may  please  Thee  to  have  mercy 
upon  all  men.  We  beseech  Thee  to  hear  us  good  Lord." 


SERMON  III. 


Peeached  m  THE  Cathedral,  Montreal,  Sunday  evening, 
September  21. 


0ot  a  Sectarian  €\)ti^t 


"Is  Christ  divided         Cor.  i.  13. 

Among  many  perils  which  seem  to  lower  like  dark 
clouds  on  the  horizon,  the  one  hope  for  our  age  and  na- 
tion lies  in  a  faithful  allegiance  to  the  living  Christ. 
It  was  the  lesson  which  He  Himself  inculcated  again 
and  again.  He  said  that  all  His  people  must  share  in 
His  divine  life,  as  the  branch  lives  by  the  sap  of  the 
vine,  as  the  members  of  the  body  live  by  the  beating  of 
the  heart. 

1.  The  main  lesson  of  the  nineteen  centuries  of  Christ's 
history  teaches  us  that  all  which  mankind  has  ever 
known  of  the  best  and  greatest  has  been  derived  from 
Him.  I  see  no  dangers  to  Christianity,  save  such  as 
arise  from  the  errors  and  the  ignoblen^ss  of  professing 
Christians.  I  feel  no  misgivings  as  to  the  future  of 
Christianity,  if  only  Christ's  sons  abide  in  love,  relying 
on  His  strength.    Then  the  waves  of  the  sea  may  rage 


3°  Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


horribly,  but  they  will  only  roar  and  strike  and  be  shat- 
tered into  mist  upon  the  winds,  into  scum  upon  the 
shore.  Then  the  heathen  may  rage,  and  the  people 
imagine  vain  things,  but  Christus  regnat,  Christus 
vincit,  Christus  imperat ;  He  sitteth  above  the  water- 
floods,  and  He  shall  remain  a  king  for  ever. 

2.  But  though  Christianity  can  never  be  finally  over- 
thrown, it  may  be,  as  in  other  ages,  temporarily  re- 
jected. It  may  suffer  an  eclipse,  disastrous,  not  indeed 
to  any  who  love  the  Lord  in  sincerity  and  truth,  but 
to  the  nations  of  a  perplexed  and  groaning  world.  Can 
one  of  your  white  river  mists  in  any  way  affect  the  sim  ? 
It  cannot  affect  the  sun,  but  it  may  grievously  trouble 
our  vision.  However  dense  the  earthly  fog,  the  sun  is 
still  shining  there  in  its  unapproachable  splendor, 
though  it  may  shed  no  warmth,  no  glory  over  a  dark- 
ened land.  Even  so  "  God  is  always  in  the  meridian," 
though  the  faithless  eye  sees  Him  no  longer.  All  the 
atheism  of  all  the  world  could  not  dethrone  the  Lord 
of  Glory,  or  silence  the  thrill  of  one  harpstring  among 
the  millions  which  warble  their  celestial  music  around 
the  presence  of  His  love ;  but  atheism  may  hide  God 
and  His  Christ  from  the  hearts  of  men,  and  intercept 
the  blessing  of  His  grace.  Even  this  it  would,  I  am 
convinced,  be  powerless  to  do  even  for  one  brief  and 
miserable  day,  except  through  our  perversities  or  our 
faithlessness.  Christianity  can  only  be  defeated  by  our- 
selves. It  will  never  be  condemned  by  the  world,  ex- 
cept because  of  our  un worthiness,  and  of  our  shortcom- 
ings. It  can  only  lose  its  influence  if  we  substitute  for 
Christ's  teaching  our  own  shibboleths.  If  we  turn 
Christianity  into  a  religion  such  as  Judaism  was  in  the 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


31 


days  of  Christ — a  religion  of  hatred,  of  suspicion,  of 
feeble  heresy-hunting,  of  party  spirit,  of  false  witness — 
depend  upon  it  that  the  world  will  cease  to  care  for  it, 
will  judge  it,  and  will  despise  it  by  its  fruits.  And 
justly  :  for  this  spirit  is  not  the  spirit  of  religion,  but 
the  spirit  of  Pharisaism ;  and  you  may  read  for  your- 
selves, if  you  care  to  understand  Christ  at  all,  that  He, 
who  was  so  infinitely  tender  to  the  weeping  harlot,  to 
the  repentant  publican,  to  the  returning  prodigal, 
blighted  the  Pharisee  "  with  a  flash  of  a  terrible  invec- 
tive." 

3.  And  bear  in  mind  that  it  is  quite  possible  to  mistake 
Christ,  and  to  mistake  Him  grievously.  Many  Chris- 
tians have  mistaken  His  teaching  in  all  ages,  from  the 
earliest  even  until  now.  Sincerity  will  not  prevent  this. 
Conviction  will  not  prevent  it.  The  Bible — especially 
the  New  Testament — shows  us  that  a  man  may  be 
utterly  sincere,  and  overwhelmingly  convinced,  and  yet 
be  wholly  in  the  wrong.  Christ's  own  apostles  again 
and  again  misunderstood  his  words.  He  spoke  to  them 
in  metaphor,  as  about  leaven,  and  with  strange  obtuse- 
ness  they  took  Him  literally.  He  spoke  to  them  liter- 
ally, as  about  His  cross  and  His  resurrection,  and  with 
strange  wilfulness  they  failed  to  accept  His  words  at  all. 
They  were  constantly  calling  forth  His  loving,  sad  re- 
buke. Now  they  tried  to  keep  o£P  the  poor  mothers 
who  brought  their  babes  for  His  blessing ;  now  they 
rebuked  one  who  was  working  miracles  in  His  name ; 
now  they  quarrelled  about  precedence  and  physical  near- 
ness to  His  presence ;  now,  in  an  Elijah  spirit  which  is 
all  too  common,  they  passionately  wanted  to  call  down 
fire  from  heaven  on  those  who  received  Him  not ;  now 


32 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


they  were  selfishly  dreaming  of  personal  thrones  and  ex- 
clusive crowns.  They  faithfully  record  for  us  their 
own  failures.  As  it  is  with  us,  so  with  them ;  Christ 
was  too  large,  too  divine,  too  loving,  too  universal,  too 
eternal  for  men's  selfish  and  finite  souls. 

4.  But,  my  brethren,  if  even  tliey  misunderstood 
Him ;  they  who  loved  Him  so  dearly ;  they  who  saw 
and  heard,  and  their  hands  handled  the  word  of  life ; 
they  Avho  listened  to  His  sermons  in  the  synagogues  and 
wandered  with  Him  in  the  cornfields  of  Galilee,  and 
sailed  with  Him  upon  the  crystal  lake  ;  they  who  had 
forsaken  all  and  followed  Him  ;— do  you  think  that  there 
is  no  danger  lest  we.  Christians  of  routine  and  birth  and 
tradition  ;  Christians  who  too  often  suffer  so  little  with 
Him,  do  so  little  for  Him,  listen  so  little  in  silence  and 
solitude  to  His  still  small  voice  ;  we  who  are  so  full  of 
self-inflation  and  jealousy  and  small  motives — is  there 
no  danger  that  we  should  misunderstand  Him  still  more 
utterly  ?  Alas  !  yes,  in  many  ways  ;  and  how  dark  and 
terrible  have  been  the  issues  of  those  errors,  let  the  blood- 
stained pages  of  Christian  history  declare.  Of  one  such 
error  I  wish  to  speak  this  evening.  If,  "cling  not  to 
me  " — the  words  which  the  risen  Jesus  addressed  to  the 
Magdalene — be  a  warning  against  the  error  of  seeking 
a  dead  rather  than  a  living  Christ,  a  Christ  after  the 
flesh  rather  than  a  Christ  in  the  spirit ;  so  the  indignant 
question,  "Is  Christ  divided?"  is  the  warning  against 
the  attempts  of  men — attempts  against  which  St.  Paul 
had  to  warn  his  converts  again  and  again — to  claim  for 
themselves  an  exclusive,  a  sectarian,  a  party  Christ.  If 
the  one  be  a  warning  against  materializing  superstition 
and  morbid  sentimentality,  the  other  is  a  warning 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


33 


against  selfish  individualism  and  religious  faction.  My 
object,  brethren,  is  to  turn  your  thoughts  to  the  truth, 
glorious  in  itself,  and  never  more  essential  than  at  this 
moment,  that  the  Lord  Christ  is  the  universal  Christ ; 
the  Christ,  not  of  one  party,  but  of  all ;  not  of  one 
church,  but  of  all ;  not  of  one  race^  but  of  all ;  not  of 
one  Christian,  but  of  all.  His  propitiation  was  olfered 
for  all  the  sins  of  the  whole  world.  He  died  to  draw 
all  men  unto  Him.  It  has  been,  and  it  is,  a  fatal 
temptation  of  Christians  to  try  to  monopolize  Christ ; 
to  talk  and  to  act  as  though  Christ  was  divided  ;  as 
though  they  alone  could  speak  of  Him  with  infallible 
knowledge,  or  worship  him  with  acceptable  service.  It 
is  a  deadly  error,  the  daughter  of  selfishness,  the 
mother  of  bigotry  and  persecution,  the  source  of  con- 
tinual weakness,  the  disintegration  of  Christianity  into 
wrangling  and  squabbling  sects.  It  springs  from  that 
stronghold  of  Satan,  disguising  himself  as  an  angel  of 
light,  the  eternal  Pharisaism  of  the  human  heart. 
When  these  Corinthians — the  most  conceited  and  self- 
asserting  of  all  Paul's  converts — said,  "  I  am  of  Christ," 
they  meant  to  browbeat  every  other  Christian  with  the 
taunt,  "  You  are  not  of  Christ."  And,  oh  !  how  often 
do  we  hear  Christians  talk  as  though  Christ  was  theirs, 
and  no  one  else's  ;  as  though  all  except  themselves  were 
altogether  wrong,  and  all  wrong  !  Let  me  lay  it  down 
as  clearly,  let  me  drive  it  home  as  forcibly  as  I  can 
through  the  gnarled  obtuseness  of  these  delusions,  that 
no  man,  and  no  sect,  and  no  church  even,  has  a  right 
thus  to  claim  Christ,  or  His  forgiveness,  or  the  merits 
of  His  redeeming  love,  as  their  special  and  peculiar, 

still  less  as  their  exclusive,  possession.    "  My  Christ ;  " 
3 


34 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


'■^  our  Christ."  What  !  has  Christ  then  been  parcelled 
into  fragments  ?  Did  Christ  die  for  a  pitiful  few  ? 
"Was  there  in  the  cross  no  meaning  except  for  a  handful 
of  the  religionists  who  happen  exactly  to  agree  with  you  ? 
Your  Christ  ?  the  Christ  of  your  sect  or  party  ?  Nay ! 
only  yours  as  He  is  the  Christ  of  all  the  world  ;  not 
yours  in  the  least,  or  in  any  way,  save  as  he  is  the  uni- 
versal brother  in  the  great  family  of  man ;  not  yours 
one  whit  more  than  He  is,  and  for  the  very  same  reason 
that  He  is,  the  Christ  of  him  whom  (it  may  be)  you 
regard  as  your  deadliest  enemy,  as  your  bitterest  oppo- 
nent ;  not  your  Christ  one  tittle  more  than  He  is  the 
Christ  of  the  man  whom  you  most  detest ;  and  not  the 
Christ  of  your  religious  faction  one  iota  more  than  He 
is  the  Christ  of  the  party  or  the  church  which  may 
be  as  near  to  Him,  yea,  even  nearer  to  Him  than  you, 
though  you  can  be  eloquent  on  what  you  delight  to  call 
their  soul-destroying  errors.  ''Christ,"  said  St.  Jerome, 
fifteen  centuries  ago,  "is  not  so  poor  as  to  have  a 
Church  only  in  Sardinia."  Christ,  we  may  say  now,  is 
not  so  poor  as  to  have  no  followers  except  at  Eome,  or 
at  Geneva,  or  at  Oxford,  or  in  Clapham  ;  not  so  poor  is 
He,  the  Lord  of  the  world  ;  not  so  narrow  He,  the  lover 
of  all  mankind,  as  to  have  none  to  be  faithful  to  Him 
except  in  the  subdichotomies  of  some  petty  schism. 
You  might  as  well  try  to  make  an  inclosure  in  God's  free 
air,  or  claim  an  arrogant  monopoly  in  God's  common 
heaven,  as  assert  that  Christ  loves  us  one  whit  more  for 
our  special  opinions,  or  is  one  whit  nearer  to  us  because 
of  our  special  ceremonies,  than  He  is  to  all  who  come  to 
Him,  to  all  who  love  Him  in  sincerity  and  truth.  There 
are,  and  there  always  will  be,  many  folds ;  there  never 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ.  35 


has  been,  and  there  never  will  be,  more  than  a  single 
flock.  When  we  brand  this  man  as  superstitious,  and 
that  man  as  latitudinarian  ;  this  man  as  a  heretic,  and 
that  man  as  a  formalist ;  they  whom  we  thus  anathema- 
tize with  our  petty  bans  are  kneeling  on  their  knees,  it 
may  be,  day  by  day,  and,  with  many  a  streaming  tear, 
are  asking  of  the  Lord,  Avho  loves  them  very  dearly,  for 
grace  and  for  guidance,  and  for  the  beatitudes  of  the 
meek  in  spirit  and  the  pure  in  heart. 

5.  But,  if  disciples  accepted  the  name  of  Cliristians 
though  it  was  given  them  in  scorn,  why  was  St.  Paul  so 
indignant  with  those  Corinthians  who  described  them- 
selves by  saying,  "I  am  of  Christ?"  "Why  docs  he 
think  them  sufficiently  rebuked  by  the  impassioned 
question,  "  Is  Christ  divided  ?  "  It  was  for  this  reason, 
that,  with  all  the  selfishness  and  bitter  cold-heartedness 
of  religions  pride,  they  were  trying  to  set  up  a  Christ 
party  among  Christians.  They  were  turning  orthodoxy 
into  that  factiousness,  which  is  the  only  meaning  borne 
in  the  New  Testament  by  the  word  "heresy."  They 
were  narrowing  the  divine  universality  of  Christ,  claim- 
ing to  be  His  only  faithful  representatives,  as  though 
they  were  the  oracles  and  orthodoxy  would  die  with 
them,  and  as  though  the  angels  had  never  sung  "  Peace 
on  earth,  good- will  toward  men."  My  brethren,  I  am 
not  preaching  to  extortioners,  unjust,  adulterers,  but  to 
Christians  ;  and  of  what  use  is  it  if  the  churches  where 
Christians  assemble  arc  the  only  places  where,  out  of 
fear  and  faithlessness,  the  distinctive  sins  of  Christians 
are  not  to  be  rebuked  ?  Two  men  went  into  the  Tem- 
ple to  pray ;  the  one  a  Pharisee,  the  other  a  publican  ; — 
which  did  Christ  rebuke  ? 


3*^  Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 

"  Two  went  to  pray — or,  rather  say, 
One  went  to  brag,  the  other  to  pray ; 
One  stands  up  close,  and  treads  on  high. 
Where  the  other  dares  not  send  his  eye. 
One  nearer  to  the  altar  trod — 
The  other  to  the  altar's  God." 

Whom  did  Christ  warn  most  often,  the  religious 
classes — scribes  and  Pharisees ;  or  the  irreligious  classes 
— publicans  and  sinners  ?  Oh  !  when  a  Christian  finds 
in  his  own  heart  this  hateful  spirit  of  exclusiveuess ; 
this  defining  of  himself  by  negatives  ;  this  writing  upon 
his  broad  phylacteries  "  I  am  holier  than  thou  ; "  let  him 
suspect  his  own  Christianity.  In  tnie  Christianity  there 
is  none  of  this  bitter  pettiness  or  ignorant  provincial- 
ism. True  Christianity  is  universal  as  our  race,  indi- 
vidual as  ourselves.  And  he  who  lives  and  talks  or 
writes  as  though  it  were  other  than  this,  whatever  may 
be  his  pretensions,  however  loudly  he  may  reiterate 
"Lord,  Lord,"  has  neither  learnt  the  most  elementary 
of  Christ's  lessons,  which  is  Christian  love  ;  nor  acquired 
the  loveliest  of  the  virtues  which  He  inculcated,  which 
is  humility  ;  nor  stooped  to  pluck  the  sweetest  of  all 
the  violets  which  grow  only  at  tlie  foot  of  His  cross, 
which  is  the  violet  of  meekness  shedding  its  perfume 
in  the  childlike  heart. 

6.  Therefore,  my  brethren,  let  our  Christ  not  be  a 
Christ  claimed  exclusively  for  our  sect,  or  claimed  self- 
ishly for  ourselves.  Let  Him  indeed  be  the  Lord,  the 
Christ,  the  only  Shepherd,  the  only  Captain,  the  only 
Master  to  us  individually.  If  He  is  this  to  us  what  will 
it  matter  what  is  said  by  contentious  men  ?  They  say  ? 
what  say  they  ?   Let  them  say !   If  Christ  be  He  to 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


37 


whom,  through  every  varying  hour  of  life's  cloud  or 
sunshine,  our  souls  turn,  as  the  sunflower  to  the  sun. ; 
He  who  sways  by  ceaseless  gravitation  the  centrifugal  im- 
pulses of  our  wayward  hearts  ;  He  at  whose  feet  we  fain 
would  sit  and  listen,  choosing  the  better  part,  amid  the 
noises  and  jostling  of  the  world  ;  if  Hebe  our  one  friend 
when  all  are  faithless ;  the  one  to  forgive  when  all  are 
resentful ;  the  one  to  commend  when  all  the  world  and 
all  the  church  denounce — ah!  happy  are  we  beyond 
all  earthly  happiness,  if  thus  individually  He  belong  to 
us !  But  even  then  we  only  claim  His  love  for  our- 
selves because  we  claim  it  for  all  the  world.  As  he 
taught  us  to  say  not  "my  Father"  but  "our  Father/' 
so  He  would  be  to  us  not  only  "my  Christ"  but  ''the 
Christ."  If,  when  He  says  to  us,  "Lovest  thou  me?" 
we  are  able  to  answer  with  the  remorseful  Peter,  "Lord, 
Thou  knowest  all  things.  Thou  knowest  that  I  love 
Thee  ;"  the  test  which  He  will  offer  to  us  of  the  sin- 
cerity of  our  love  will  not  be  our  creeds  or  our  ceremo- 
nies, but  "tend  my  little  lambs"  and  "feed  my  sheep." 
To  an  expanded  egotism,  to  an  inflated  religiosity,  to  a 
party  exciusiveness,  he  will  say,  "I  never  knew  you." 
The  work  of  all  such  builders  on  the  one  foundation  will 
assuredly  be  burnt,  though  the  workman  be,  by  God's 
mercy,  saved.  But  to  all  who  love  God  and  love  their 
neighbor,  and  strive  in  love  only  to  do  the  things  which 
He  says — to  them,  whatever  they  have  called  themselves 
on  earth — to  them  He  will  say,  "  I  was  sick  and  ye  visited 
me,  hungry  and  ye  fed  me,  in  prison  and  ye  came  to  me. 
Ye  have  loved  your  brethren — not  hated  and  slandered 
them.  Come  ye,  blessed  of  my  Father,  enter  into  the  king- 
dom prepared  for  you  from  the  foundation  of  the  world!" 


38  Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


7.  And  so,  my  brethren,  as  the  phxin,  practical  con- 
clusion, I  would  say,  while  humbly,  while  on  bended 
knees,  while  with  contrite  hearts  and  scarce-uplifted 
eyes,  we  may  in  our  own  solitude  whisper,  "I trust,  I 
hope,  that  I  am  of  Christ,  if  only  He  will  pardon  even 
the  best  of  all  I  am ;  "  let  iis  beware  of  saying  in  the 
arrogant,  exclusive  sense,  "I  am  of  Christ,  and  you  are 
not."  Let  us  beware  of  that  miserable  spirit  which 
dwarfs  and  degrades  the  grandeur  of  Christianity.  Nay, 
but  0  man,  who  art  thou  that  judgest  another  ?  We 
are  not  the  only  sound,  or  the  only  orthodox  persons ;  all 
from  whom  we  differ  are  neither  so  benighted  in  dark- 
ness nor  so  plunged  in  error  as  our  conceit  fancies. 
We  cannot  ruin  Christianity  more  effectually  than  by 
stamping  it  with  faction.  We  have  no  right  to  brand 
as  heresy  every  point  of  difference  in  which  our  brother 
worships  the  God  of  his  fathers.  The  deadliest  of  all 
heresies,  the  only  heresy  which  goes  to  the  verge  of 
the  unpardonable,  is  that  petty  sectarian  bitterness  in 
which  Christians  have  so  often,  and  so  fatally  suffered 
themselves  to  run  riot.  The  revolting  violences  of  the 
Donatist  schism ;  the  disgraceful  turbulence  of  many 
church  councils ;  the  infamous  cruelties  of  the  Inqui- 
sition ;  the  mutual  burnings  and  cursings  of  Catholics 
and  Protestants ;  the  placing  by  Christians  of  other 
Christians  out  of  the  pale  of  salvation ;  the  furious 
controversies  of  Calvinists  and  Arminians  ;  the  fierce 
struggles  of  Jansenists  with  Jesuits,  of  Puritans  with 
Churchmen,  of  Churchmen  with  Methodists — all  these 
disgraceful  and  melancholy  crimes  in  the  church's  his- 
tory have  sprung  from  the  attempts  to  divide  Christ,  to 
tear  into  fragments  His  seamless  robe.    And  Christ  is 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ.  39 


the  exclusive  Christ  of  none  of  these,  and  yet  the 
universal  Christ  of  all  who  keep  His  commandments, 
who  do  what  He  says,  who  love  Him  and  love  all 
His  children  in  sincerity  and  truth.  He  is  the  Christ 
of  none  of  these  collectively  in  their  sectarianism  and 
wrath  ;  of  all  of  these  individually  in  their  sincerity  and 
penitence. 

It  is  not  his  sect  or  profession,  not  the  S  S  on  his  col- 
lar or  the  crucifix  pressed  to  his  heart  which  makes  a 
man  in  any  way  of  Christ;  it  is  not  his  crude  dogma  or  his 
denunciative  negation  ;  it  is  not  his  vain  shibboleth  or 
fantastic  service;  it  is  not  his  personal  pride  or  corporate 
assumption  ;  it  is  not  anything  upon  which  he  relies  as 
separating  him  from  others,  in  doctrine  or  in  ritual, 
which  makes  any  one  of  us  a  Christian.  These  things 
are  but  rubbish  which  shall  shrivel  into  nothing,  which 
shall  slip  into  white  ashes  in  the  revealing  and  consum- 
ing flame;  but  the  only  thing  which  makes  a  man  a  Chris- 
tian, the  only  thing  which  makes  you  or  me  a  Christian,  is 
that  which  we  have,  I  trust,  in  common  with  those  who 
hate  us  most,  and  whom  we  are  most  tempted  to  hate — 
namely,  our  common  Christianity  :  the  silent  hour  when 
we  go  sorrowing  through  the  faultful  past ;  the  sincere 
self-sacrifice  ;  the  humble  effort  to  attain  the  elementary 
Christian  gi'aces ;  the  forgiveness  of  injuries ;  the  love 
for  others ;  the  tear  of  penitence  ;  the  heart  at  leisure 
from  itself.  Christians  of  all  sects,  and  of  all  parties, 
and  of  all  churches — Romanist,  Anglican,  Baptist, 
Methodist,  Independent,  Ritualist,  Evangelical,  Broad 
Churchman,  whatever  you  are,  whatever  you  call  your- 
self— you  may  go  with  Wesley  in  his  dream  to  the  gate 
of  hell,  to  the  realm  of  the  dead,  wherever  it  be,  wherein 


40  Not  a  Sectarian  Christ. 


are  all  who  are  not  yet  admitted  to  the  near  presence  of 
their  God,  and  ask  :  "  Are  there  any  Romanists,  Angli- 
cans, Baptists,  Methodists,  Ritualists,  Evangelicals, 
Broad  Churchmen  here  ?  "  and  the  answer  in  each  case 
shall  come  to  you  :  "Yes,  a  great  many."  And  then 
sadly  you  may  go  to  the  gate  of  Heaven  and  ask:  "Are 
there  any  Romanists,  Anglicans,  Dissenters,  Ritualists, 
Evangelicals,  Broad  Churchmen  here  ?  "  and  the  answer 
shall  come  to  you  in  prompt  music  :  "  None  whatever." 
And  when  you  ask  in  surprise,  "  Who  then  are  there 
here?"  the  answer  shall  come  to  you:  "Is  Christ 
divided  ?  We  do  not  know  any  of  your  schisms  and  your 
factions  and  your  subdichotomies  here ;  we  know  no 
name  but  that  of  Christians  here."  Constantino  told 
Acesius  to  go  and  find  a  ladder  and  get  to  heaven  by  him- 
self. But  that  is  what  no  man  ever  yet  has  done.  Not 
by  any  wretched  ladder  which  he  would  fain  charter 
for  himself,  or  for  his  sect,  has  any  soul  ever  yet  got 
there ;  but  only  by  that  ladder  of  which  the  rounds 
must  be  trod  by  us  side  by  side  with  the  supposed  here- 
tics whom  (it  may  be)  we  most  denounce,  or  the  poor 
publicans  whom  we  most  despise  ;  and  that  ladder  is  the 
universal  love  of  God  in  Christ.  Upon  the  shining 
rungs  of  that  ladder  angels  ever  ascend  and  descend 
upon  the  Son  of  man.  Have  we  not  read  how  Christ  se- 
lected as  his  model  of  love  to  our  neighbor  neither 
Priest  nor  Levite,  but  the  hated  and  heretical  Samari- 
tan? how  he  said  of  the  Gentile  soldier  that  he  had  not 
found  so  great  faith,  no,  not  in  Israel  ?  how  he  never 
drew  a  severer  picture  of  angry  religionism  than  that  of 
the  elder  brother  of  the  prodigal,  whose  elder-brother- 
liness  of  spirit  has  reproduced  itself  from  age  to  age  to 


Not  a  Sectarian  Christ.  41 


dim  the  ardor  of  Christianity  and  cramp  its  efforts  and 
quench  its  joy  ?  Learn  then  His  own  lesson.  He  is  not 
the  Christ  of  the  selfish  worshipper.  He  is  not  the 
Christ  of  the  railing  party.  He  is  not  the  Christ  of  the 
self-satisfied  few.  He  is  not  the  Christ  of  Papal  Oratory; 
or  City  Tabernacle  ;  or  Ebenezer  Chapel  ;  or  Revivalist 
Mission  Hall ;  He  is  the  Christ  of  none  of  these  as  such, 
of  all  of  these,  and  of  you  and  me  also,  as  in  our  better 
moments  we  rise  out  of  our  own  factions  and  separar 
tions  and  self-assertions,  to  breathe  the  large  air,  and 
gaze  on  the  illuminating  light  of  truth  and  humility,  of 
purity  and  love. 

Wouldst  thou  be  a  Christian  ?  Then  lay  aside  thy 
rags  of  self-satisfaction,  thy  badges  of  party,  thy  envv 
and  bitterness  and  strife.  Ceremonial  observances  are 
not  religion  ;  multiplied  functions  are  not  religion ; 
long  prayers  are  not  religion ;  orthodoxy  of  creed  is 
not  religion.  Parts  of  religion,  elements  of  religion, 
aids  to  religious  feeling  to  this  or  that  man,  they  may 
be — religion  they  are  not.  But  to  visit  the  fatherless 
and  widows  in  their  affliction,  and  to  keep  ourselves 
unspotted  from  the  world,  that  is  religion ;  and  right- 
eousness and  peace  and  joy  in  believing,  that  is  re- 
ligion ;  and  to  do  the  things  which  Christ  says,  that 
is  religion  ;  and  all  the  charities  which  bind  man  to 
man,  and  which  bless  the  family,  the  nation,  and  the 
world,  these  are  religion  ;  and  this  is  religion,  to  love 
God  with  all  our  hearts,  and  our  neighbor  as  ourselves  ; 
and  this  is  religion,  to  do  justly,  and  to  love  mercy,  and 
to  walk  humbly  with  our  God. 

It  was  no  latitudinarian,  it  was  no  rationalist,  but  it 
was  a  Romanist,  a  monk,  a  Dominican — it  was  the  elo- 


42  Not  a  Sectarian  Christ, 


quent  and  holy  Pdre  Lacordaire — who  said,  "Where 
there  is  the  love  of  God,  there  is  Jesus  Christ  ;  and 
where  Jesus  Christ  is,  there  is  the  church  with  Him." 
It  was  no  saint,  it  was  no  schoolman,  but  it  was  the  brave 
and  honest  martyred  President  of  the  United  States,  who 
said,  "When  a  church  inscribes  on  its  portals  the  two 
great  commandments  of  the  Law  and  Gospel,  and  makes 
obedience  to  them  its  test  of  membership,  to  that  church 
will  I  belong. "  If  you  do  not  love  your  brother,  how- 
ever tremendous  the  truths  which  you  utter  with  your 
lips,  your  Christianity  is  heathendom,  and  the  kingdom 
of  God  is  not  within  you.  Read  as  much  theology  as 
you  like  between  the  lines  of  what  Christ  said  to  the 
young  ruler,  but  if  you  are  living  in  sin  it  will  not  avail 
you ;  you  will  not  have  even  begun  to  enter  into  life. 
A  religion  which  divorces  belief  from  morality — a  re- 
ligion which  thinks  to  please  God  either  by  orthodox 
formulae  or  ceremonial  observances  without  charity — is 
no  better  than  a  blasphemy.  The  throne  of  Christ  can 
only  be. set  up  in  the  heart  of  man,  not  in  his  actions  ; 
in  the  life  of  man^  not  upon  his  lips. 


SERMON  IV. 


Preached  in  the  Cathedral  at  Toronto,  Wednesday,  Sept, 
23,  1885. 


Cl^e  tion  in  tl^e  i^eatt 


"  Thou  shalt  tread  upon  the  liou  and  adder  ;  the  young  lion 
and  dragon  shalt  thou  trample  under  feet. " — Ps.  xci.  13. 

Thebb  are  lions  on  the  path  of  life  which  the  sloth- 
ful man  will  not  encounter,  but  which  the  brave  man 
fights,  and  in  the  long  run  slays.  There  are  pei'ils 
which  come  to  us  from  the  world,  the  flesh,  and  the 
devil,  perils  from  the  lions  of  outward  and  public  wick- 
edness, which  we  have  to  face  in  our  lives  as  citizens 
and  as  men.  In  his  struggle  against  the  varied  forms 
of  sin  and  vice  which  are  without  and  around  him,  the 
brave  man  may  often  be,  or  seem  to  be,  defeated,  though 
in  such  cases  his  very  defeat  carries  in  it  the  germs  of 
future  and  of  certain  victory.  When  the  good  man 
seems  to  be  conquered,  the  powers  of  evil  have  still  to 
rue  their  short-lived  triumph,  and  to  say  as  Pyrrhus 
said  when  he  defeated  the  Komans  :  "  Three  such  vic- 
tories would  utterly  ruin  me."  To-day,  however,  we 
have  to  speak  of  a  different  slaying  of  lions  ;  of  a  con- 


44  The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 

test  within  us,  not  without  us ;  of  a  contest  in  which,  if 
we  would  not  be  lost,  we  must,  God  helping  us,  win 
the  victory — the  personal,  the  assured,  if  not  in  this 
life,  the  absolute  and  final  victory.  It  is  a  subject,  my 
friends,  which  we  may  make  intensely  practical ;  a  sub- 
ject which  directly  affects  every  one  of  us,  whatever  our 
age  or  our  circumstances ;  for  upon  the  issue  of  this 
contest  the  strength,  and  the  majesty,  and  the  blessed- 
ness of  every  other  contest  depends.  Oh  !  may  the 
Holy  Spirit  of  God,  who  sendeth  forth  His  seraphs  with 
the  live  coal  from  his  altar  to  touch  the  lips  of  whom 
He  will,  so  help  me  to  speak,  so  open  your  ears  and 
touch  your  hearts,  to  hear,  that  by  His  grace  every  one 
of  us  may  leave  this  church  awakened,  solemnized — 
more  resolute,  more  hopeful,  more  determined  to  make 
his  stand  against  the  powers  of  evil,  and  to  work  out 
his  own  salvation,  with  fear  indeed  and  trembling,  yet 
with  the  indomitable  energy  and  sternest  concentration 
of  every  power  of  his  will ! 

1.  We  learn  from  Scripture  and  from  experience,  that  a 
picture,  an  allegory,  especially  if  it  be  unhackneyed,  may 
sometimes  bring  a  great  truth,  or  a  pressing  duty,  home 
to  the  mind  and  conscience,  when  the  mere  unimagina- 
tive inculcation  of  it  may  fail  to  furrow  the  trodden 
ground  of  our  familiarity.  Such  an  allegory  is  involved 
in  the  words  of  my  text,  and  in  other  passages  of  Scrip- 
ture. The  divine  promise,  "  Thou  shalt  tread  upon  the 
lion  and  adder,"  refers  not  only  to  the  reptiles  and  wild 
beasts  of  outward  evil,  but  also  to  evils  in  which  the 
deadliness  of  sin  is  concentrated  against  our  individual 
hearts  ;  the  evil  thoughts  and  deeds  and  words  and  hab- 
its which  assault  and  hurt  the  soul.   Wlien  the  author 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


45 


of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  says  of  the  olden  saints 
that  they  stopped  the  mouths  of  lions,  he,  too,  doubtless 
means  his  words  to  be  understood  metaphorically  as  well 
as  literally.  So,  too,  does  St.  Paul,  when  he  says  he  had 
"  fought  with  beasts  at  Ephesus,"  and  that  God  "  deliv- 
ered him  out  of  the  mouth  of  the  lion."  So,  too,  did 
St.  Ignatius,  when  he  says  that  on  his  way  to  martyrdom 
he  was  "fighting  with  wild  beasts"  all  the  way  to 
Eome,  and  describes  the  Roman  soldiers  who  conducted 
him  as  "  ten  leopards"  with  whom  he  had  to  struggle. 
So,  too,  when  David  prays  to  God,  "  Break  the  jawbones 
of  the  lions,  0  Lord  ! "  he  is  not  thinking  of  actual  lions, 
but  of  human  and  of  spiritual  enemies.  If  therefore  we 
again  adopt  the  metaphor,  we  are  no  more  guilty  than 
these  were  of  using  language  which  is  fantastic  or  sensa- 
tional. And  the  naturalness  of  the  metaphor  is  shown 
by  the  fact  that  we  find  it  also  in  heathen  mythology. 
Let  us  not  follow  the  ignorant  prejudice  which  would 
regard  the  religious  thoughts  of  the  heathen  as  though 
they  were  unworthy  of  our  Christian  notice.  We  have 
been  learning  more  and  more  in  these  days  that  there 
was,  thank  God,  an  Ethnic  as  well  as  a  Hebrew  inspira- 
tion. The  noble  study  of  Comparative  Religion,  which  is 
now  opening  our  minds  and  widening  the  horizon  of  our 
thoughts,  has  revealed  to  us  that  God  spoke  in  old  times 
to  the  Greek  and  the  Roman  and  the  Persian  and  the 
Hindoo  as  well  as  to  the  Jew.  All  wisdom  is  not  hid  in 
Moses'  Law.  God  had  other  sheep  also,  though  they 
"were  not  of  Israel's  fold.  Now,  in  the  higher  and  uncor- 
rupted  springs  of  Greek  mythology  we  find  the  purest 
moral  intuitions  of  that  marvellously  gifted  race.  If 
there -was  one  virtue  which  they  admired  above  all 


46 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


others,  it  was  the  virtue  of  2oocppoavvT},  of  sobermind- 
edness,  which  is  also  earnestly  impressed  upon  all,  and 
especially  upon  young  men,  by  St.  Paul  and  St.  Peter. 
Now,  if  St.  Paul,  even  on  the  Scripture  page,  freely 
quotes  Callimachus  and  Aratus  and  Epimenides,  may 
not  we  refer  also  to  pure  lessons  of  Greek  morality?  And 
the  Greek  type  of  this  noble  virtue,  their  ideal  picture 
of  a  life  strong  in  its  self-control,  almost  divine  in  its 
self-sacrifice — their  type  of  a  slayer  of  monsters  and  de- 
liverer of  the  world — was  the  hero  Hercules.  Grossly 
as  that  ideal  was  stained  and  dwarfed  by  the  polluted  im- 
agination of  later  poets,  the  hero  stands  in  old  mythol- 
ogy as  the  grand  representative  of  toiling,  suffering,  per- 
secuted, dauntless,  victorious  manhood  ;  the  embodied 
conception  of  a  life  raised  to  immortality  by  mighty 
toil  for  the  good  of  others.  And  they  saw,  as  we  must 
see,  that  he  who  would  indeed  conquer  evil  in  the  world, 
must  first  conquer  it  in  his  own  heart.  To  the  Christian 
it  must  never  be  said  as  to  the  Pharisaic  Jew  :  "  Thou, 
therefore,  that  teachest  another,  teachest  thou  not  thy- 
self ?  Thou  that  preachest  a  man  should  not  steal,  dost 
thou  steal  ?  Thou  that  sayest  a  man  should  not  commit 
adultery,  dost  thou  commit  adultery?  Abhorrer  of  idols, 
dost  thou  rob  temples  ?  "  This  is  the  meaning  of  that 
fine  apologue,  the  choice  of  Hercules — in  which  the 
young  hero,  just  at  the  crisis  of  opening  manhood — just 
as  the  bud  of  life  is  bursting  into  flower — just  as  the 
path  of  life  is  dividing  into  two,  of  which  one  leads  to 
holiness,  and  the  other  to  the  abyss — makes  his  choice 
for  self-denying  virtue,  not  for  unlawful  pleasure.  But 
the  moral  is  yet  more  finely  conveyed  in  that  legend  of  his 
conquest  of  the  Nemeau  lion,  which  they  placed  first  of 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


47 


his  twelve  great  labors.  You  will  observe  that  the  Greek 
hero  is  always  represented  in  his  adolescence  as  mantled 
in  the  shaggy  and  invulnerable  fell  of  this  conquered 
wild  beast.  Look  at  any  of  the  spendid  Greek  coins 
which  represent  him,  and  you  will  always  find  his 
head  and  back  half-shrouded  in  that  lion's  skin.  But 
you  need  not  go  far  to  see  it.  Among  the  allegorical 
figures  sculptured  on  the  monuments  of  the  great 
Abbey  of  Westminster,  from  which  I  come,  you  may 
see,  at  least  twice,  the  mighty  figure  of  Hercules  in  his 
lion-robe. 

Now,  doubtless,  to  slay  an  actual  lion  is  something. 
Scripture  deems  it  worthy  of  record  that  lions  were 
slain  by  the  youthful  David,  and  the  youthful  Samson  ; 
but  neither  Samson  nor  David  wore  a  lion's  skin  in 
memory  of  their  prowess  all  the  rest  of  their  lives.  No  ! 
but  the  skin  of  the  Nemean  lion  which  the  Greek  hero 
slew  had  a  special  meaning.  It  was  held  to  make  him 
invulnerable,  and  well-nigh  invincible,  thereafter.  Let 
me  tell  you  the  reason  of  this  in  the  words  of  a  great 
living  writer.  It  was  because  this  lion  was  "not  merely 
a  large  specimen  of  Felis  Leo  ranging  the  fields  of  Ne- 
mea.  This  Nemean  cub  was  one  of  a  bad  litter.  Born 
of  Typhon  and  Echidna,  the  whirlwind  and  the  snake — 
Cerberus  his  brother,  the  Hydra  of  Lerna  his  sister— it 
must  have  been  diflBcult  to  get  his  hide  off  him.  He 
had  to  be  fought  in  darkness,  and  dealt  upon  without 
weapons,  by  grip  of  the  throat — arrows  and  club  of  no 
avail  against  him.  What  is  the  meaning  of  all  that  ? 
It  means  that  the  Nemean  lion  is  the  first  great  adver- 
sary of  life,  whatever  that  may  be,  to  Hercules,  or  to 
any  one  of  us,  then  or  now — the  first  monster  we 


48 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


have  to  strangle  or  to  be  destroyed  by,  fighting  in  the 
dark,  and  with  none  to  help  us.  Every  man's  Ne- 
mean  lion  lies  in  wait  for  him  somewhere.  It  is  the 
first  ugly  and  strong  enemy  that  rises  against  us,  all 
future  victory  depending  on  victory  over  that.  Kill 
it,  and  through  all  the  rest  of  your  life  what  was  once 
dreadful  is  your  armor,  and  you  are  clothed  with 
that  conquest  from  every  other,  and  helmed  with  its 
crest  of  fortitude  for  evermore.  Alas  !  we  have  most 
of  us  to  walk  bareheaded;  but  that  is  the  meaning 
of  the  story,  and  surely  it  is  worthy  to  be  thought 
and  to  be  taken  to  heart."  The  lion's  skin  then  was 
meant  only  as  an  emblem  of  the  lion-heart,  proved  and 
strengthened  by  the  overthrow  of  its  earliest  tempta- 
tions 

2.  Now  note  first,  my  friends,  that  this  lion  of  the 
Greek  allegory  has  to  be  fought  in  darkness,  in  the  cav- 
ern, with  no  earthly  weapons.  It  is  not  the  stout  club, 
it  is  not  the  keen  arrows,  which  can  slay  it.  You  must 
block  up  the  exit  of  the  cave,  you  must  step  boldly  into 
its  entrance,  you  must  plunge  through  its  murky  gloom, 
and  there,  by  the  sheer  force  of  arm,  by  the  resolute 
might  of  that  will  which  God  has  given  you,  and  which 
is  strengthened  for  you  by  the  spirit  of  Christ,  you  must 
fairly  and  pitilessly  strangle  this  lion.  The  lion  is  that 
inward  sin,  that  special  impulse  and  temptation  which 
has  most  power  against  you.  It  is  the  favorite  vice 
against  which  you  are  weakest.  Oh  !  my  brethren,  let 
none  of  us  shirk  the  momentous  question  !  Are  you,  or 
are  you  not,  wrestling  with — have  you,  or  have  you  not 
conquered — the  sin,  whatever  it  may  be,  which  doth 
most  easily  beset  you  ?   Eemember  that  God  will  have 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


49 


no  reservations.  Remember  that  His  law  is  that  you 
must  keep  all  the  commandments — not  all  but  one. 
Ob,  do  not  deceive  yourself  with  the  fancy  that  there  is 
one  sin  which  you  may  cherish  for  yourself — one  law 
which  may  be  violated  with  impunity.  On  the  Tree  of 
Death,  as  on  the  Tree  of  Life,  there  are  twelve  manner 
of  fruits  ;  but  God  will  not  suffer  you  to  pluck  so  much 
as  one  of  them,  because  into  each  one  of  them  is  in- 
fused the  utter  deathfulness  of  all.  There  is  not  one  of 
them  all  which  is  not  an  apple  of  Sodom  ;  not  one  which 
is  not  full  of  ashes  and  poison,  of  dust  and  bitterness. 
Millions  of  men  would  be  saved,  almost  without  an 
effort,  but  for  one  sin  :  the  miser  but  for  his  gold  ;  the 
drunkard  but  for  his  drink ;  the  envious  man  but  for 
his  malice ;  the  unclean  but  for  his  guilty  love  or  his 
desecrating  vice.  Herod  hears  John  gladly  ;  does  many 
things  because  of  him  ;  but  there  is  one  thing  he  will 
not  do  :  he  will  not  give  up  Herodias.  Judas  is  Christ's 
disciple  ;  he  is  one  of  the  twelve ;  but  he  cannot  forego 
his  thirty  pieces  of  silver.  Lorenzo  de  Medici  listens 
earnestly  on  his  deathbed  to  Savonarola,  but  there  is 
one  thing  he  will  not  do :  he  only  turns  away  his  face 
and  remains  silent  when  the  Prior  of  San  Marco  bids 
him  to  set  Florence  free.  The  guilty  adulterous  king  in 
the  great  tragedy  can  pray  with  passion,  but  because  he 
vainly  fancies  that  he  may  be  pardoned  and  retain  the 
offence ;  even  on  his  knees  there  is  one  thing  which  he 
feels  he  will  not  do— he  will  not  give  up  "his  crown, 
his  own  ambition,  and  his  queen."  It  is  the  state  of 
mind  so  pathetically  portrayed  by  our  great  living  poet 
in  his  picture  of  Sir  Lancelot,  in  his  allegory  of  the 

Idyls  of  the  King  : 
4 


50 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


My  own  name  shames  me,  seeming  a  reproach. 
Alas  !  for  Arthur's  greatest  knight,  a  man 
Not  after  Arthur's  heart !   1  needs  must  break 
These  bonds  that  so  defame  me  : — not  without 
She  wills  it :  would  I,  if  she  willed  it  ?  Nay, 
Who  knows  ?   But,  if  I  would  not,  then  may  God 
I  pray  Him  send  a  sudden  angel  down. 
To  seize  me  by  the  hair,  and  bear  me  far, 
And  fling  me  deep  in  that  forgotten  mere, 
Among  the  tumbled  fragments  of  the  hiUs.* 
So  prayed  Sir  Lancelot  in  remorseful  pain, 
Not  knowing  he  would  die  a  holy  man." 

And  such  a  prayer  is  natural.  When  a  man  is  sinning 
against  light  and  knowledge,  when  he  has  wilfully 
given  himself  up,  sold  himself  to  do  evil,  when  there  is 
but  one  sin  against  which  he  cannot  make  up  his  mind 
honestly  to  struggle,  he  is  but  losing  himself  more  and 
more  hopelessly  in  a  pathless  morass  ;  he  is  sinking 
deeper  and  deeper  into  an  unfathomable  sea ;  he  is  but 
entangling  himself,  in  more  and  more  hopeless  bondage, 
with  a  heavier  and  ever  heavier  chain.  Let  a  man  but 
give  himself  over  to  a  besetting  or  unrepented  sin,  and 
all  else  becomes  in  vain. 

"  Lord  I  with  what  care  hast  thou  begirt  us  round  I 

Parents  first  season  us  ;  then  schoolmasters 
Deliver  us  to  laws  ;  they  send  us  bound 

To  rules  of  reason  ;  holy  messengers  ; 
Pulpits  and  Sundays  ;  sorrow  dogging  sin  ; 

Afflicrions  sorted  ;  anguish  of  all  sizes  ; 
Fine  nets  and  stratagems  to  catch  us  in  ! 

Bibles  laid  open  ;  millions  of  surprises  ; 
Blessings  beforehand  ;  ties  of  gratefulness  ; 

The  sound  of  glory  ringing  in  our  ears, 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


51 


Without  our  shame,  within  our  conscience, 

Angels  and  grace  ;  eternal  hopes  and  fears — 
Yet  all  these  fences,  and  their  whole  array. 
One  cunning  bosom-sin  blows  quite  away  I " 

Therefore,  my  brethren,  as  you  love  your  liyes,  enter 
alone,  and  with  awful  resolution,  the  dark  cavern  of  your 
own  hearts  ;  face,  once  for  all,  the  lion  who  lies  lurking 
there  ;  lay  aside  utterly  the  fancy  that  he  can  remain 
there  without  destroying  you  ;  give  up  the  idle  notion 
that  you  can  fence  yourself  around  against  him,  by  rea- 
son, or  philosophy,  or  prudential  reserves,  or  vague 
procrastinations  of  the  struggle.  Nothing,  nothing  will 
save  you  but  desperate  wrestling  with  all  the  gathered 
forces  of  your  life,  intensified  by  grace  and  prayer.  Oh, 
win  that  victory ;  slay  that  lion ;  give  it  but  one  fatal 
wound,  and  though  its  filming  eye  may  still  glare,  and 
its  relaxing  claw  still  have  strength  to  rend  you,  each 
subsequent  blow,  each  tightened  grasp  upon  its  throat, 
shall  find  it  weaker,  shall  see  you  growing  from  strength 
to  strength,  until  at  last  you  shall  fling  out  of  its  lair 
the  huge  carcass,  and  turn  the  cavern  into  a  holy  temple, 
and  Christ  shall  enter  there. 

Christ  shall  enter  there,  for  observe,  my  friends,  the 
infinite  superiority  of  blessing  which  Christ  has  granted 
to  us  in  these  last  days.  The  Greeks  had  noble  ideals, 
but  their  conduct,  nationally  alike  and  individually,  fell 
far  short  of  those  ideals  ;  and  even  their  ideals  were,  as 
in  the  conception  of  this  their  great  demigod,  soon 
and  grievously  corrupted.  It  was  as  if  their  moral 
teacher  had  meant  to  imply,  by  the  legend  of  their  hero, 
the  lesson  which  the  Old  Testament  teaches  us  by  the 
examples  of  Samson,  of  David,  and  of  Solomon,  that 


52 


The  Liott  in  the  Heart. 


human  strength  is  at  the  best  but  perfect  weakness. 
But  to  us  the  mercy  of  God  has  given,  in  the  life  and 
example  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  an  ideal  not  human 
but  divine.  In  the  most  perfect  conception  of  Christ 
presented  to  us  by  mediaeval  art,  on  the  western  front 
of  the  Cathedral  of  Amiens — the  Beau  Dieu  d' Amiens, 
as  it  is  affectionately  called — He  is  represented  between 
vines  and  lilies,  emblems  of  beneficence  and  purity ; 
and  His  feet  rest  upon  the  lion,  which  is  the  emblem 
of  furious  passions,  and  on  the  cockatrice,  which,  lying 
with  one  ear  in  the  mud,  and  closing  the  other  with 
its  tail,  is  the  fit  symbol  of  that  vicious  dalness  and 
venomous  debasement  over  which  every  true  man  must 
gain  an  utter  and  final  victory.  But  the  conquest  of 
Christ  over  all  the  elements  of  evil  is  a  conquest  in 
which  we  may  share ;  and  the  divine  strength  where- 
with He  triumphed  is  a  strength  which  He  gives  to 
them  that  seek  it.  In  His  strength,  though  by  His 
grace  alone,  it  is  possible  for  every  one  of  us  to  "  tread 
upon  the  lion  and  the  adder ;  and  the  young  lion  and 
dragon  to  trample  under  foot." 

3.  But  notice,  my  friends,  that  the  more  early  this 
battle  is  undertaken,  the  more  surely  is  it  won.  Her- 
cules, in  the  legend,  while  yet  an  infant  in  the  cradle, 
strangles  the  serpents  sent  to  slay  him.  He  who  stran- 
gles serpents  in  his  youth,  will  slay  monsters  in  his  man- 
liood.  He  of  whom  the  grace  of  God  has  taken  early 
hold,  and  who  has  had  early  strength  to  conquer  tempta- 
tion, is  not  likely,  later  on,  to  lose  his  self-reverence 
and  self-control.  If  in  the  flush  of  youth  he  has  sat  at 
the  feet  of  law,  he  will  be  little  likely  to  revolt  after- 
wards.   And  these  were  the  truths  which  the  Greeks 


The  Liofi  in  the  Heart. 


53 


succinctly  expressed  by  representing  their  hero  in  the  in- 
vulnerable skin  of  the  lion  he  has  slain.  It  is  in  youth, 
in  early  youth,  that  men  can  most  effectually  win  their 
victory — while  yet  they  are  uncontaminated  by  a  corrupt 
present,  unhampered  by  an  unfaithful  past.  The  victory 
is  won  more  easily  at  fifteen  than  at  twenty  ;  and  more 
easily  at  twenty  than  at  thirty  ;  and  ten  thousand  fold 
more  easily  at  thirty  than  at  sixty.  Samson,  while  he  is 
a  youth,  while  he  is  a  Nazarite,  while  yet  the  sunny 
locks  of  his  obedience  to  the  moral  law  lie  waving  upon 
his  illustrious  shoulders — in  those  pure  days  Samson  can 
rend  the  young  lion  which  roars  against  him  as  easily  as 
if  it  were  a  kid  : — ah  !  he  could  do  so  no  longer  after  his 
locks  were  shorn  ;  after  his  life  was  sullied  ;  after  he  has 
lain  in  the  harlot  lap  of  Philistine  Delilah.  When  his 
heart  had  been  corrupted,  his  will  effeminated,  his  hab- 
its depraved,  you  will  see  him  rending  lions  no  longer, 
but  toiling  as  a  drudge  of  his  enemies — 

"  Eyeless,  at  Gaza,  in  the  mill,  with  slaves." 

And  David,  while  he  is  still  a  bright  and  ruddy  shep- 
herd lad,  his  heart  white  as  the  lilies  which  he  twined 
round  his  harpstrings  to  protect  them  from  the  heat, 
and  his  thoughts  pure  as  the  dew  upon  their  leaves ; — 
David  the  young  boy,  uncontaminated  by  pride  and  the 
lust  of  cities,  can  fight  for  his  lambs,  and  with  unarmed 
hand  smite  both  the  lion  and  the  bear.  He  could  not 
have  done  it  after  that  sin  against  Uriah,  that  sin  with 
Bathsheba,  had  laid  waste  his  heart.  Then  the  flutter 
of  a  shaken  leaf  was  enough  to  terrify  him  ;  then  the 
crown  fell  from  his  head  ;  then  he  became  weak  as 
water  ;  then  he  fled  before  his  own  worthless  son,  bare- 


54 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


footed,  sobbing,  cursed  by  his  enemies,  up  the  hill  of 
Olivet ;  then  the  dark  spirits  of  lust  and  blood  began  to 
walk  in  his  house,  and  in  his  heart.  And  alas  !  which 
of  us  has  not  been  in  one  way  or  other  defeated  ?  Which 
of  us  can  encounter  that  poison-breathing  lion  in  the 
dark  cavern  of  his  heart,  and  strangle  it  fearlessly  as 
once  he  might  have  done  ?  How  grandly  has  Milton 
expressed  this  weakness  of  sin,  when  the  mighty  Fallen 
Spirit  is  rebuked  by  one  of  the  humblest  of  heaven's 
angels — the  young  Ithuriel : 

"  So  spake  the  cherub  ;  and  his  grave  rebuke, 
Severe  in  youthful  beauty,  added  grace 
Invincible  :  abashed  the  devil  stood. 
And  felt  how  awful  goodness  is,  and  saw 
Virtue  in  her  shape  how  lovely  ;  saw  and  pined 
His  loss  ;  but  chiefly  to  find  here  observed 
His  lustre  visibly  impaired." 

And  again  in  the  case  of  our  first  parents  after  their 
Bin,  when  they  rose — 

"  As  from  unrest,  and  each  the  other  viewing, 
Soon  found  their  eyes  how  opened,  and  their  minds 
How  darkened  ;  innocence,  that  as  a  veil 
Had  shadowed  them  from  knowing  ill,  was  gone  ; 
Just  confidence,  and  native  righteousness. 
And  honor  from  about  them,  naked  left 
To  guilty  shame." 

And  how  is  that  infinitely  pathetic  tragedy  repeated  day 
after  day,  age  after  age,  in  the  brief  life  of  man  !  "  The 
first  unequivocal  act  of  wrong,"  says  an  American 
writer,  "  that  has  left  its  trace  in  my  memory  was  this  : 
refusing  a  small  favor  that  was  asked  of  me — nothing 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


55 


more  than  telling  what  had  happened  at  school  one 
morning.  No  matter  who  asked  it,  but  there  were  cir- 
cumstances which  saddened  and  awed  me.  I  had  no 
heart  to  speak.  I  faltered  some  miserable,  perhaps 
petulant  excuse,  and  stole  away,  and  the  first  battle  of 
my  life  was  lost.  What  remorse  followed  I  need  not 
tell.  Then  and  there,  to  the  best  of  my  knowledge,  I 
first  consciously  took  sin  by  the  hand,  and  turned  my 
back  on  duty.  Time  has  led  me  to  look  on  my  offence 
more  leniently.  I  do  not  believe  it,  or  any  other  child- 
ish wrong,  is  infinite,  as  some  have  pretended,  but  in- 
finitely finite.  Yet  oh  !  if  I  had  but  won  that  battle  !" 
Ah  !  my  brethren,  you  may  be  unable  to  recall  the  time 
you  made  as  it  were  your  first  agreement  with  hell,  your 
first  covenant  with  death.  The  memory  of  your  first 
transgression  may  be  clouded  over  by  the  white  mists 
of  time ;  but  is  there  any  one  among  you  all  who  does 
not  echo  from  his  heart  that  sigh  of  vain  regret,  "Oh  ! 
if  I  had  but  won  that  battle  ! " 

4.  But,  my  brethren,  lest  such  thoughts  should  tempt 
any  of  you  to  despair,  let  me  add  at  once  that  it  is  never 
too  late  to  fight,  never  impossible  to  slay  that  lion  of 
evil  within  you,  and  to  tread  the  young  lion  and  the 
dragon  under  foot.  If  the  grace  of  God  shows  exqui- 
sitely as  a  vernal  rose  in  some  soul,  pure  from  its  youth 
upward,  growing  like  the  Lord  Jesus  in  wisdom  and 
stature  and  favor  with  God  and  man,  that  grace  shows 
yet  more  mightily  in  the  case  of  those  who,  having 
fallen— having,  as  it  were,  lain  prostrate  in  the  bloody 
dust — having  felt  the  fierce  teeth  and  the  merciless 
claws — spring  up  again,  gather  fresh  strength,  turn  de- 
feat into  resistance,  and  resistance  into  victory. 


56 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


Be  not  you  like  the  unhappy  persecuting  bishop,  who 
exclaimed  upou  his  deathbed  :  "  I  have  sinned  with 
Peter  ;  alas  !  I  have  not  repented  with  Peter  ! "  Do 
not  say:  "But  my  heart  is  so  corrupt,  it  is  so  like  a 
volcano  of  evil  passions  that  it  cannot  be  subdued ; " 
God  can  clothe  even  the  sides  of  the  volcano  with  corn- 
field and  vineyard,  and  iill  its  very  crater  with  conse- 
crated snow. 

Who  are  the  special  trophies  of  the  irresistible  love  of 
Christ,  of  the  irresistible  power  of  the  Cross  of  Christ  ? 
In  whose  case  does  He  on  his  Cross  make  an  open  show 
of  conquered  principalities  and  powers  ?  Not  in  Enoch 
the  immaculate  ;  not  in  Abraham  the  friend  of  God  ; 
not  in  John  the  Nazarite  ;  not  in  John  the  Divine  ;  not 
in  Stephen  with  his  face  like  the  face  of  an  angel  :  nay, 
but  in  the  son  who  was  dead,  and  is  alive  again,  who 
was  lost  and  is  found  ;  in  the  prodigal  rescued  from  rags 
and  the  far  land,  and  the  husks  and  swine,  into  the 
pure,  rejoicing  home  ;  in  the  Magdalene,  out  of  whom 
he  cast  seven  devils  ;  in  the  harlot,  who  washed  His 
feet  with  her  tears  and  wiped  them  with  the  hair  of  her 
head  ;  in  the  publican,  whom  He  transformed  into  an 
Apostle  ;  in  the  demoniac,  seated  at  His  feet  clothed 
and  in  his  right  mind ;  in  the  adulteress,  who,  as  she 
sobbed  on  the  Temple  floor  amid  her  tangled  hair,  heard 
those  healing  words,  "  Neither  do  I  condemn  thee  ;  go, 
and  sin  no  more  ; "  in  the  leper  cleansed  ;  in  the  impotent 
man  at  the  pool  of  Bethesda  ;  in  the  cursing,  swearing, 
denying  Apostle,  whose  heart  He  broke  with  one  tender 
look.  These  are  the  trophies  of  the  Cross  ;  these  are  the 
lost,  torn  sheep  over  whom  the  Good  Shepherd  rejoices  ; 
these  the  repentant  sinners  over  whom  the  angels  strike 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


57 


their  harps  of  gold.  And,  oh  !  will  not  you  be  one  of 
these — the  redeemed,  the  ransomed  of  the  Lord,  coming 
back  from  exile  and  from  Babylon,  coming  back  with 
singing  unto  Zion,  and  everlasting  joy  upon  your  heads  ? 
You  may  be  a  weak,  you  may  be  a  bad,  you  may  be  a 
corrupt,  you  may  be  a  defeated  man  :  all  your  life  may 
have  been  wasted  ;  you  may  have  sunk  deeply  into  evil 
habits  and  the  mire  of  sin.  Yet  I  would  fain  kindle 
your  courage  ;  fain  first  waken  to  a  spark,  then  into  a 
glow,  then  into  clear  and  leaping  flame,  those  dying 
embers  which  lie  cold  under  the  white  ashes  of  your 
hopes.  Though  your  sins  be  as  scarlet,  they  shall  be 
white  as  snow  :  though  they  be  red  like  crimson,  they 
shall  be  as  wool.  Do  not  let  the  devil  make  you  neglect 
those  words  as  though  to  you  they  meant  nothing. 
Nay  !  they  are  God's  voice  to  you,  Christ's  message  to 
you,  the  Spirit's  appeal  to  you — even  to  you.  Are  you 
a  drunkard  ?  Have  you  sunk  by  imperceptible  grada- 
tions through  many  years  into  that  shameful  vice  ? — 
there  is  not  one  drunkard  he?e  who  may  not  die  a  tem- 
perate man.  Are  you  dishonest  ?  Have  you  for  years 
been  making  profits  by  fraud  and  lies  ?  You  can  this 
very  day  break  your  false  balance,  and  melt  your  unjust 
weights.  Is  your  heart  burning  with  bad  passions  ?  Are 
you  an  adulterer,  or  a  fornicator,  or  are  you  laying  waste 
by  any  unlawful  indulgence  the  inner  sanctities  of  your 
being  ?  Young  men,  there  is  not  one  of  you — ^not  even 
the  guiltiest — who  may  not  become  strong  and  pure. 
Is  some  sin,  unrevealed  to  man,  known  only  to  your- 
selves, smouldering  like  -^tnean  lava,  black  by  day, 
lurid  by  night,  in  the  dark  places  of  your  agonized  con- 
science ?   Well,  now  it  is  a  part  of  you ;  but  if  you  will 


58 


The  Lion  in  the  Heart. 


repent,  if  you  will  put  away  from  you  the  unclean  thing, 
if  you  will  seek  God  on  your  knees,  if  even  yet  you  will 
summon  the  shamed,  routed,  scattered,  weakened  forces 
of  your  being  to  the  battle  of  God,  He  will  so  help  you 
that,  far  as  the  East  is  from  the  West,  so  far  will  He  put 
from  you  the  sin  which  now  bums  your  heart.  My 
brethren,  because  Satan  knows  that  despair  is  fatal, 
therefore  he  will  try  hard  either  to  keep  you  indifferent, 
or  to  drive  you  to  despair,  to  suUenness,  to  obstinacy,  to 
defeat,  and  to  self-abandonment.  He  will  whisper  to  you, 
"  You  are  too  far  gone.  These  hopes,  these  possibilities, 
these  promises  are  for  others,  not  for  you."  But  oh,  my 
brother,  they  are  for  you,  if  you  will  not  put  them  from 
you.  You,  even  you,  weak  and  torn  as  you  are,  can 
still  strangle  that  full-grown,  that  full-fed  lion  whose 
paw  is  on  your  heart.  Was  not  King  David  a  murderer, 
an  adulterer,  and  yet  God  gave  him  back  the  clean  heart 
and  the  free  spirit  ?  Was  not  King  Manasseh  an  apos- 
tate, a  worshipper  of  Moloch,  and  yet  did  he  not  learn 
to  know  that  the  Lord  was  God?  Was  not  Saul  of 
Tarsus  a  blasphemer,  a  persecutor,  and  injurious,  and 
did  he  not  become  a  very  vessel  of  election  ?  Was  not 
Augustine  a  heretic  in  religion,  a  debauchee  in  life,  yet 
did  he  not  live  to  be  a  saint  of  God  ?  Was  not  John 
Bunyan  once  a  godless  tinker,  and  did  he  not  grow  up  to 
write  the  "Pilgrim's  Progress  ?"  If  you  have  sinned 
with  these,  can  you  not  with  these  repent  ?  Yes, 
with  these  "  thou  shall  tread  upon  the  lion  and  the  ad- 
der ;  the  young  lion  and  the  dragon  shalt  thou  trample 
under  feet."  If  the  archangel  be  beautiful  in  all  the 
grace  and  glory  of  youthful  victory,  who  puts  his  foot  on 
the  conquered  dragon,  and  has  no  speck  of  dust,  no  stain 


The  Lion  m  the  Heart. 


59 


of  blood  upon  his  gleaming,  invulnerable  panoply — more 
pathetically  beautiful  it  may  be,  in  the  sight  of  God,  is 
that  angel  who  is  victorious,  though  it  have  only  been 
after  agonies  and  energies,  only  with  sobbing  breath  and 
hacked  sword  and  battered  shield  and  soiled  glory  and 
trailing  wing ; — and  such  is  the  angel  of  redeemed  hu- 
manity.   The  best  of  us  is  scarcely  saved. 

Whom  did  Christ  come  to  save  ?  The  good  or  the 
bad  ?  The  pure  or  the  impure  ?  "  This  is  a  true 
saying,  and  worthy  of  all  acceptation,  that  Christ  Jesus 
came  into  the  world  to  save  sinners."  To  save  sinners, 
and  therefore  to  save  you.  To  save  the  guilty,  and 
therefore  to  save  you.  To  save  the  bad,  and  therefore  to 
save  you.  And  if  you  will  take  it  in  no  words  but  His 
very  own,  take  it  in  these  :  "  I  am  not  sent,"  He  said, 
"  but  to  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel."  "  I  am 
not  come,"  he  said,  "  to  call  the  righteous,  but  sinners  " 
— not  the  righteous,  but  sinners — "  I  am  not  come  to 
call  the  righteous,  but  sinners  to  repentance." 


SERMON  V. 


Preached  in  London,  Ontaeio,  Sept.  27,  1885. 


Cl^e  Retribution  upon  ^elfijsi^ 


"And  when  He  was  come  near,  He  beheld  the  city,  and  wept 
over  it,  saying,  If  thou  hadst  known,  even  thou,  at  least  in  this 
thy  day,  the  things  which  belong  unto  thy  peace  I — But  now  they 
are  hid  from  thine  eyes." — Luke  xix.  41,  42. 

The  epoelis  in  the  life  of  Jesus  are  full  of  divine  in- 
stnictiveness.  He  had  lived  thirty  years  in  the  quiet 
family,  and  humble  labor  of  a  despised  provincial  village. 
He  had  one  year  of  bright  Galilean  welcome;  one  year  of 
gathering  and  deepening  antagonism  ;  one  year  of  flight 
for  his  life  among  the  heathen  ;  and  perhaps  half  a  year 
during  which  he  was  an  excommunicated  outcast  with 
a  price  upon  his  head.  Those  closing  scenes  which  take 
up  almost  a  third  of  the  gospel  narrative,  only  occupied 
the  few  days  from  Palm  Sunday  to  Good  Friday.  Our 
Lord  had  taken  refuge  from  the  rage  of  the  spiritualty 
in  an  obscure  village  named  Ephraim ;  and  it  was  not 
until,  from  its  conical  mount.  He  saw  the  throngs  of 
Passover  pilgrims  streaming  down  the  Jordan  valley,  that 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  6i 

it  became  possible  for  Him,  under  the  protection  of  His 
Galilean  followers,  to  venture  Himself  into  the  perilous 
vortex  of  the  Jewish  religious  world.  He  had  slept  the 
Sabbath  night  at  Bethany.  On  Palm  Sunday  morning 
the  enthusiasm  of  His  disciples  made  Him  the  centre  of 
a  rejoicing  throng  as  He  set  out  for  the  short  distance 
to  Jerusalem.  Some  of  you  may,  like  myself,  have 
traversed  that  memorable  ground.  If  so  you  will  viv- 
idly remember  the  spot,  upon  the  Mount  of  Olives, 
where  paused  those  blessed  feet 

"  Which  eighteen  hundred  years  ago  were  nailed 
For  our  salvation  to  the  bitter  cross." 

It  is  one  of  the  few  spots  on  which  we  can  be  absolutely 
certain  that  the  feet  of  our  blessed  Lord  have  stood,  for 
exactly  at  that  spot  the  road  sweeps  round  the  shoulder  of 
the  hill,  and  the  domes  and  minarets  of  Jerusalem  burst 
suddenly  upon  the  view.  As  we  stand  there  we  can 
realize  the  passion  and  the  naturalness  of  the  emotions 
which  crowded  the  soul  of  the  world's  Redeemer.  We 
can  realize  why,  at  that  particular  place,  in  spite  of  the 
joy  of  His  followers  and  the  glad  throng  which  met  Him 
from  Jerusalem  with  hosannas  and  branches  of  waving 
palm.  He  stayed  the  course  of  His  meek  triumph  to 
weep  aloud  over  the  city,  which  gleamed  beneath  hira, 
unconscious  of  its  doom.  There,  with  its  glorious  sanct- 
uary standing  out  against  the  blue  sky  like  a  mountain 
of  snow  and  gold ;  there,  with  its  impregnable  walls  and 
marble  palaces  and  imperial  diadem  of  towers,  the  City 
of  David  flashed  back  the  burning  dawn, — and  knew  not 
the  day  of  her  visitation.  And,  as  though  in  perpetual 
warning,  on  the  other  side  of  the  hill  on  which  He 


62     The  Retribution  tipon  Selfish  Societies. 

stood,  gloomed,  far  beneath  Him,  the  sullen  cobalt-col- 
ored stagnancy  of  the  accursed  Lake  which  had  ingulfed 
the  guilty  Cities  of  the  Plain.  Like  that  Dead  Sea  the 
city— the  Holy,  the  Noble  City,  as  it  is  still  called— 
"reflected  Heaven  upon  her  surface,  while  she  hid 
Gomorrah  in  her  heart."  Scrupulously  orthodox,  re- 
ligiously self-satisfied,  never  more  outwardly  observant 
of  the  utmost  scrupulosities  of  legalism,  slavishly  exact 
in  tithes  of  mint  and  anise  and  cumin,  fasting  twice  in 
the  week,  rigidly  adherent  to  every  tradition  of  feast 
and  new  moon  and  solemn  assembly,  heaping  her  altars 
with  thousands  of  rams  and  ten  thousands  of  rivers  of 
oil,  crowded  to  overflowing  at  that  very  moment  with 
multitudes  of  Easter  worshippers, — but  hollow  at  heart, 
greedy  of  gain,  taking  for  holiness  a  lip-profession  of  or- 
thodoxy and  an  outward  slavery  to  ceremonial ;  idolatrous 
of  a  somnolent  conventionality  which  cared  for  forms 
and  fringes,  and  cared  not  for  mercy,  righteousness,  and 
justice  ;  self-deceived  by  the  superficial  gleam  of  her 
own  hypocrisy,  drop  by  drop,  wholly  unsuspicious  of 
her  peril,  she  was  filling  up  to  the  brim  the  cup  of  her 
iniquities.  Four  days  were  to  pass,  and  then  those  self- 
deceiving  professors  of  religion,  who  had  defiled  the  very 
springs  of  true  religion  with  pride,  insincerity,  and  ha- 
tred, were  to  commit  the  most  awful  of  human  crimes. 
Was  it  wonderful,  if,  in  a  voice  broken  by  sobs,  with  a 
face  which  streamed  with  tears,  Jesus  gazed  on  the  city 
and  wept  over  it,  and  said:  "If  thou  hadst  known, 
even  thou,  at  least  in  this  thy  day,  the  things  which 
belong  unto  thy  peace  ! — But  now  they  are  hid  from 
thine  eyes ! " 

In  deadly  peril  unawares — ^that  is  the  lesson  of  the 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  63 


pathetic  scene.  It  is  a  warning  against  the  delusion  of 
false  types  of  godliness.  No  doubt  if  there  had  been 
any  Levite,  or  hierarch,  or  Pharisee  in  that  humble 
crowd  of  Galileans,  they  would  have  laughed  Him  to 
scorn.  "  What  fanaticism  !  What  exaggeration  !  What 
intemperate  language  !  What  want  of  respect  for  the 
religious  authorities!  What  lack  of  theology  and  of 
good  church  manship  !  What  foolish  invective  of  the 
national  progress !  The  times,  on  the  contrary,  were 
never  better.  Keligion  was  never  more  respected.  The 
Temple  courts  were  never  more  thronged  with  worship- 
pers. The  Sabbaths  are  kept  in  a  way  which  would  have 
satisfied  Shammai  himself.  All  this  denunciation  of 
guilt,  all  this  menace  of  doom,  is  due  only  to  the  fumes 
of  a  heated  imagination."  And  much  of  what  these  Le- 
vites  said  would  have  been  very  plausible.  They  and  the 
people  whom  they  led  were  very  sound  as  to  the  current 
shibboleths.  "  Lord,  Lord,"  was  being  repeated  at  Jeru- 
salem with  endless  iteration  and  solemn  unction.  At  the 
Temple  there  were  many  services  a  day.  The  syna- 
gogues were  well  attended  ;  the  prayer-houses  were  al- 
ways open.  And  yet — such  was  Christ's  awful  judg- 
ment— true  religion  was  dead.  The  religiosity  demurely 
enthroned  in  its  place  was  but  a  lying  spirit  which  mim- 
icked its  saintly  gestures  and  holy  words.  That  was 
what  the  Lord  said,  and  that  was  what  they  contemptu- 
ously refused  to  believe. 

And,  indeed,  the  words  of  Jesus  on  the  hill-side, 
that  spring  morning,  seemed  to  make  no  sort  of  differ- 
ence. The  sunlight  still  poured  its  glowing  splendor 
over  courts  of  cedar  and  gates  of  gold.  The  palms  un- 
folded their  new  green  fronds.    The  lilies  of  the  field 


64    The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies. 

still  embroidered  the  grass  witk  blue  and  purple  and 
scarlet.  The  gazelle  still  bounded  on  Jiidah's  hills. 
The  fig-trees  still  clothed  themselves  in  the  glossy  leaves 
which  dissembled  their  barrenness  of  fruit.  And,  as  the 
spring  passed  on,  the  grapes  began  to  purple  and  the 
plains  to  roll  their  billows  of  golden  corn,  and  the  fresh 
dates  to  be  sprinkled  with  their  rich,  yellow  dust. 
And  religion,  as  the  Jewish  mind  understood  it,  con- 
tinued to  flourish  unimpaired  for  forty  years.  The 
altars  smoked.  The  Pharisees  put  on  their  broad  phylac- 
teries. "The  two  kidneys  and  the  fat"  were  burned 
with  most  solemn  scrupulosity.  The  white-robed  Levites 
sang  their  psalms  on  the  Temple  steps.  Yes  !  but  Christ 
had  died  on  the  accursed  tree.  Yes  !  but  they  had 
murdered  the  Lord  of  glory  !  And,  unheard,  the  awful 
fiat  had  gone  forth  against  the  city,  which,  red  with  the 
blood  of  the  Prophets,  was  too  hypocritical  even  to  re- 
alize its  own  hypocrisy — the  awful  fiat:  "  Never  fruit 
grow  upon  thee  more."  Yes  !  and  all  the  while  the 
decree  was  being  accomplished.  Soon  the  lightnings 
began  to  flicker  over  the  doomed  nation  as  the  Destroy- 
ing Angels  drew  in  the  distance  their  swords  of  flame ; 
and  when  the  children  who,  on  Palm  Sunday,  had 
shouted  Hosanna,  were  still  in  the  prime  of  manhood, 
Jerusalem  and  her  orthodoxies,  and  her  ceremonialism, 
and  her  religious  cliques  became  a  seething  hell  of  every 
furious  passion,  and  collapsed  in  three  years  of  siege 
into  a  scene  polluted  and  accursed — a  heap  of  blood- 
stained ashes,  an  unrecognizable  desolation,  a  terrible 
monument  of  the  just  Judgment  of  God. 

And  so,  once  more,  was  enacted  an  old  event — old, 
yet  constantly  renewed,  in  the  story  of  humanity  ;  and 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  65 


there  was  one  of  those  many  rehearsals  of  the  Day  of 
Judgment  and  of  the  coming  of  the  Lord  which  yet 
have  failed  hitherto  to  convince  guilty  nations  that  for 
avarice  and  idolatry,  for  malice  and  lust  and  fraud,  for 
Belial  and  Mammon  and  Moloch,  for  unbelief  and  for 
hypocrisy,  and  for  hatred  of  the  truth  there  is  but  one 
destiny.  Evil  may  be  long-lived,  but  doomsday  comes 
at  last. 

The  comings  of  the  Lord  are  ever  thus — ^long  in 
their  apparent  delay,  overwhelming  in  their  sudden 
accomplishment.  Slowly  the  electric  forces  are  gathered 
and  stored  in  the  stifling  air;  suddenly  is  it  rent  by 
the  gleaming  thunder-bolt  !  Man's  judgment  days  are 
partial,  hasty,  unjust,  mechanical.  God's  assize  is 
silent.  His  retributions  execute  themselves.  His  thun- 
der-bolts are  slowly  hammered  by  our  own  hands  in  the 
furnace  of  our  iniquities,  when  at  last  they  gleam  with 
the  white  heat  of  Divine  anger,  and  they  rush  down 
with  unerring  aim  on  the  head  of  him  who  has  been 
forging  them.  Meanwhile  His  handwritings  are  on 
every  wall.  And  though  men  and  churches  and  nations 
are  blind  to  them,  and  go  spinning  round  their  circle  of 
custom  and  compromise  after  the  giddy  flag  of  their 
popular  falsehoods,  they  read  at  last  by  the  unnatural 
glare  of  ruin  that  "  God  is  the  only  final  public  opin- 
ion." Of  all  this  our  Lord  had  again  and  again  warned 
the  civil  and  religious  authorities  of  His  day — the 
Caiaphases  and  the  Herods,  the  peering  Levites,  the 
cold-hearted  Priests,  the  formalizing  Pharisees,  the 
heresy-hunting  spies  sent  from  Jerusalem,  the  unreal, 
careless,  religion-professing  people.  He  had  warned  them 
in  vain.    At  first  they  only  sneered  ;  then  they  hated  ; 


66    The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies. 

at  last  they  slew  Him.  "  And  as  were  the  days  of  Noah, 
so  shall  be  the  coming  of  the  Son  of  Man.  For  as,  in  the 
days  which  were  before  the  Flood,  they  were  eating  and 
drinking,  marrying  and  giving  in  marriage,  until  the 
day  that  Noah  entered  into  the  Ark,  and  the  flood  came 
and  destroyed  them  all,  so  shall  be  the  coming  of  the 
Son  of  Man."  "Likewise  also  as  it  was  in  the  days  of 
Lot;  they  ate,  they  drank,  they  bought,  they  sold,  they 
planted,  they  builded ;  but,  in  the  day  that  Lot  went 
out  from  Sodom,  it  rained  fire  and  brimstone  from 
heayen,  and  destroyed  them  all.  Even  thus  shall  it  be 
in  the  day  when  the  Son  of  Man  is  revealed." 

I  ask,  Have  not  these  warnings  of  the  Lord  been  re- 
peated again  and  again,  and  all  in  vain,  in  the  history 
of  the  nations  ?  There  was  a  profound  intuition  in  the 
Greek  legend  of  Cassandra  and  the  Roman  legend  of  the 
Sibyl :  the  Greek  legend  of  the  Prophetess  to  whose 
prophecies  none  listened,  but  which  always  came  to 
pass  ;  the  Roman  story  of  the  aged  Sibyl  who  burnt  her 
Books  of  Fate  if  they  were  refused.  The  world  of  Noah 
was  not  the  only  world  in  which  God  has  drowned 
crime,  when  least  men  dreamed  of  it,  in  floods  of  calam- 
ity ;  the  city  of  Sodom  was  not  the  only  city  on  which, 
hardly  even  in  metaphor,  God  out  of  the  clear  sky 
has  rained  down  fire  from  heaven.  In  olden  days  look 
at  cruel,  bloody,  rapine-reeking,  man-torturing  Assyria, 
and  read  her  doom  in  cities  of  which  the  very  ruins 
have  been  calcined  and  ploughed  into  the  dust.  Look 
at  arrogant,  corrupt,  luxurious  Babylon,  and  in  that 
mound  of  indistinguishable  debris  by  the  Euphrates, 
read  the  fulfilment  of  the  "Mene,  mene,  tekel"  which 
once  glared  before  her  king's  eyes  at  the  banquet  of  his 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  67 

satraps.  Look  at  Tyre,  and  see  how  God  has  spread  the 
fisher's  net  over  her  stately  palaces.  Look  at  Pagan 
Kome,  in  the  decline  of  her  Empire,  and  in  the  lurid 
pictures  of  the  Apocalypse,  read  the  judgments  of 
Heaven  on  her  deep  pollutions,  and  her  wicked  human 
gods.  What  ruined  her  ?  Why  did  Goth,  and  Hun, 
and  Vandal  thunder  unresisted  at  her  gates  ?  Why  did 
her  glories  sink  into  ruin,  and  her  Caesars  perish  one 
after  another  by  murder  or  by  suicide  ?  Why  did  her 
population  become  year  by  year  a  viler  and  loathlier 
scum  ?  I  will  tell  you.  It  was  because  the  hearts  of 
her  sous  were  stained  through  and  through  with  the 
vilest  passions.  It  was  because  her  merchandise  was  not 
only  in  gold,  and  silver,  and  crimson,  and  thyme  wood, 
but  also  in  the  bodies  and  souls  of  men.  It  was  because 
her  cities  were  cities  like  those  which  the  sulphur 
choked,  and  the  scoriae  buried,  as  though  the  very  ele- 
ments revolted  against  the  flagrancy  of  their  unblushing 
depravities.  The  fate  of  Kome  was  the  fate  of  a  people 
who,  once  fioigal  and  temperate,  had  become  aestheti- 
cally corrupt,  luxuriously  effeminate. 

"  Rome  shall  perish !  write  that  word 
On  the  blood  that  she  hath  spilt, 
Perish,  hated  and  abhorred, 
Deep  in  ruin  as  in  gmlt." 

Why  did  she  perish  ?  because  of  her  too  glaring  con- 
trasts between  shivering  pauperism  and  colossal  wealth. 
Because  she  found  no  men  strong  enough  to  rule,  and 
so  flung  the  reins  of  government  to  the  noisiest  and  the 
worst.  If  society  will  lay  aside  its  gossip,  and  youth  its 
follies  to  meditate  upon  the  lessons  of  History  they  will 


68     The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies. 


read  there  of  the  wealth,  vice,  and  corruption  which 
ended  in  barbarism — of 

"Their  sumptuous  gluttonies,  and  gorgeous  feasts 
On  citron  tables,  or  Atlantic  stone  ; 
Their  wines  of  Letia,  Gales,  and  Falerne, 
Chios  and  Crete,  and  how  they  drank  in  gold, 
Crystal  and  myrrhine  cups,  embossed  with  gems." 

History  is  a  great  Book  of  God,  and  in  it  I  read,  "  These 
are  the  things  which  bring  nations  to  the  grave,  with 
their  pomp,  and  the  noise  of  their  viols ;  and  it  is  be- 
cause of  these  things  that  Hades  from  beneath  is  moved 
to  meet  them  at  their  coming,  and  the  dead  nations  cry 
to  them,  'Art  thou  also  become  weak  as  we  ?  Art  thou 
become  like  unto  us  ?  How  art  thou  fallen  from  heaven, 
0  Lucifer,  son  of  the  morning !  How  art  thou  cut 
down  to  the  ground  who  didst  weaken  the  nations  ! ' " 

But  it  was  not  only  in  the  Old  World  that  God  vis- 
ited the  nations;  nor  is  Jerusalem  the  only  city  over 
which  Christ  has  to  weep  for  the  coming  doom  of  hypo- 
critic  churches  and  corrupt  societies. 

Look  at  Christian  History. 

i.  At  one  time  Byzantium  reigned  supreme.  Why 
did  she,  to  the  lasting  shame  of  Europe,  fall  into  the 
hands  of  the  Turks,  who  were  to  be  for  so  many  centu- 
ries a  terror  to  her  in  their  power,  and  a  curse  to  her  in 
their  decay  ?  Because  in  the  city  of  Constantine  religion 
had  long  shi-ivelled  into  a  gross  formalism ;  and  craft, 
and  corruption,  and  midnight  murder,  and  incessant 
treachery  had  reduced  her  into  weakness  and  shame. 

ii.  At  another  time  Venice  was  supreme.  Her  doge 
was  among  the  princeliest  potentates  of  Christendom. 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  69 

Her  gonfalon  represented  the  power  of  the  sea.  Her  art 
was  the  pride  and  glory  of  Europe.  Why  did  her  glory 
fade,  suddenly  as  a  rainbow,  from  the  wings  of  her  Lion 
of  St.  Mark's  ?  Those  who  have  read  her  history  with 
the  closest  and  deepest  attention  have  told  us  that  the 
cause  of  her  failure  also  was  the  collapse  of  faith  in  her 
children,  followed  also  by  collapse  of  morals,  of  all 
spiritual  insight  and  of  all  nobleness  of  aim. 

iii.  Or  look  at  Spain.  Spain,  like  Jerusalem,  was 
eminently  orthodox,  eminently  Catholic,  eminently  re- 
ligious. The  king  was  called  "  the  Catholic,"  and  he, 
■with  the  vilest  of  all  the  Popes,  founded  the  Inquisi- 
tion—that worst  product  of  infernal  ignorance  animated 
by  infernal  zeal.  And  Spain  sank,  partly  through  her 
servile  superstition  and  Moloch- worshipping  intolerance, 
and  partly  through  her  insatiate  thirst  for  gold. 

iv.  Or  look  once  more  at  the  medieval  Papacy.  In 
the  oft-repeated  irony  of  heaven,  she  never  seemed  so 
rich  or  so  terrible  as  when,  in  the  year  of  Jubilee,  the 
year  1300,  her  priests  stood  raking  into  her  coffers  the 
gold  of  the  pilgrims,  which  was  too  plentiful  to  count. 
And  yet  a  few  years  after,  at  Anagni,  her  Pope  Boni- 
face VIII.— a  Pope  who  had  gained  his  Papacy  by 
seniory  and  maintained  it  by  craft— received  from  the 
descendant  of  one  whose  ancestor  a  priestly  tyranny  had 
burnt  to  death,  that  blow  upon  the  cheek  which  first 
disenchanted  Europe,  broke  the  sceptre  of  Romish 
usurpation.  But  perhaps  you  may  fancy  that  God's 
judgments  upon  cities,  and  nations,  and  priestcrafts 
ended  in  the  Middle  Ages,  and  are  an  anachronism  in 
modern  times. 

9.  If  you  want  yet  nearer  witnesses  than  these  that 


70    The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies. 


nations  perish  because  they  know  not  the  day  of  their 
visitation,  has  the  nineteenth  century,  in  its  self-com- 
placent materialism,  forgotten  the  fearful  lesson  of  the 
eighteenth  ?  Has  the  meaning  of  the  French  revolu- 
tion of  1792  faded  from  our  memories — that  day  of 
visitation, 

•  When  all  men  stood  aghast  and  pale. 
As  if  to  see  the  azure  sky 
Come  shattering  down,  and  show  beyond 
The  black  and  bare  infinity  ?" 

Have  we  forgotten  how  a  people  without  heart  and 
without  hope,  trampled  into  the  dust  by  insolent  op- 
pression, living  on  grass  and  nettles,  spoke  at  last  in 
the  lion-roar  of  Danton  ?  How  a  crushed  multitude 
sprang  to  its  feet  at  last  and  smote  the  hoary  head  of 
inveterate  abuse  ?  How  men  danced  the  Carmagnole  in 
the  desecrated  churches  of  a  dead  religion,  and  deluged 
the  guillotine  alike  with  innocent  and  with  guilty 
blood  ?  or  has  the  year  1885  forgotten  the  political 
overthrow  of  1868  ?  or  how — when  in  1871  the  military 
pride  of  France  slipped  into  ashes  like  the  body  of  some 
exhumed  king — men  read  the  demon  passions  of  godless 
people  by  the  light  of  Paris  blazing  with  petroleum. 
Why  did  this  happen  ?  Her  own  sons,  alike  a  Eenan 
and  a  Dumas,  each  in  his  own  style,  gave  the  answer.  It 
was  because  her  young  men  were  shamefully  demoralized. 
It  was  because  her  public  spirit  was  miserably  dead.  It 
was  because  her  traders  were  lying  and  cheating  to  get 
gain  in  the  very  crisis  of  her  agony.  It  was  because 
there  prevailed  in  France  an  atheism,  at  once  blasphe- 
mous and  feeble  ;  a  corruption  at  once  naked  and  not 
ashamed. 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  71 

10.  And  might  not  the  voice  of  Jesus  have  cried 
through  the  centuries.  Oh  Nineveh,  oh  Sodom,  oh 
Babylon,  oh  Tyie,  oh  Venice,  oh  Spain,  oh  Papal 
Eome,  oh  France,  and  yet  again  oh  France — if  thou 
hadst  known,  even  thou,  at  least  in  thy  day,  the  things 
that  belong  to  peace — but  now  they  are  hid  from  thine 
eyes  I  And  oh  England,  oh  America,  oh  Canada, — 
knowest  thou  the  day  of  thy  visitation  ?  Hast  thou  no 
fear  of  God's  silent  judgment  days?  Ah!  if  ye  would 
be  indeed  safe  and  indeed  prosperous  with  an  abiding 
prosperity,  take  deeply  to  heart  the  lesson  that  "Right- 
eousness exalteth  a  nation,"  and  that  "  sin  is  the  re- 
proach of  any  people."  See  that  the  infidelity,  which, 
in  many  regions,  grows  daily  more  avowed  and  more 
unblushing,  cause  no  ravage  in  your  folds.  Beware  lest 
trade  and  commerce  should  become  corroded  with  dis- 
honesty and  adulteration.  See  that  the  holy  day  of 
rest  and  worship  become  not  a  day  of  idle  pleasure.  Be 
on  thy  guard  against  that  hasting  to  be  rich  which  shall 
not  be  innocent.  Take  heed  that  thy  churches  become 
not  dead  in  formalism,  and  that  thy  religion  shrivel  not 
into  a  thing  of  parties,  and  opinions,  and  outward 
forms.  See  that  thy  sons  and  daughters  be  not  absorbed 
in  pleasure,  or  in  worldliness,  or  in  greed  of  gold.  Then 
shalt  thou  be  safe  under  the  shadow  of  the  Almighty, 
and  His  banner  go  before  thee,  and  His  glory  be  thy 
reward.  But  if  thou  heed  not  these  lessons,  then  art 
thou  not  afraid  ?  Is  not  thy  religion  a  thing  of  parties, 
and  opinions,  and  outward  forms  ?  Art  thou  not  afraid 
lest  God  should  say  to  thee  as  of  old,  by  the  voice  of 
Amos,  to  so  many  nations,  "for  three  transgressions, 
and  for  four  I  will  not  turn  away  the  punishment 


72    The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies. 

thereof ; "  for  the  luxury  which,  with  a  coldness  of 
heart  icy  as  the  pool  of  Cacytus,  has  "too  many  claims  " 
to  spare  for  the  good  of  man  and  the  glory  of  God  more 
than  the  paltriest  driblets  from  its  superfluity  ;  for  the 
drink,  against  which,  in  spite  of  the  revolting  misery 
and  abysmal  degradation  which  it  causes,  we  fight  in 
vain  ;  for  the  gossiping  personality,  which  poisons  the 
whole  air  with  its  ignoble  pettiness  ;  for  the  love  of 
money,  which  sticks  to  the  fingers  and  degrades  the 
soul  ;  for  three  transgressions  and  for  four  will  God 
send  upon  sinful  nations  his  sore  punishments  ;  for  the 
senseless  betting  and  gambling  which  drives  so  many 
young  men  into  vice  and  crime;  for  the  immorality 
which  fills  the  streets  of  Christian  cities  with  the  living 
dead  ;  for  the  spirit  of  malice  and  hatred  which  forces 
its  way  into  society,  into  senates,  and  into  churches  ;  for 
the  hollowness  which  praises  God  with  the  lips,  while 
the  heart  is  far  from  Him. 

We  are  proud  of  our  science.  Will  science  save  a 
people  from  demoralization  ? 

"If  we  trod  the  deeps  of  ocean,  if  we  struck  the  stars  in  rising, 
If  we  wrapped  the  globe  intently  in  one  hot  electric  breath, 
'Twere  but  power  within  our  tether,  no  new  spirit-power  com- 
prising. 

And  in  life  we  are  not  greater  men,  nor  bolder  men  in  death." 

We  talk  about  our  philanthropy.  Will  our  philan- 
thropy save  us  ?  I  take  a  different  view  of  it.  I  look 
on  the  vaunted  charities  not  as  the  sign  of  our  muni- 
ficence, but  as  the  demonstration  of  our  meanness.  We 
boast  of  our  civilization.  I  recall  how  often  in  history 
civilization  has  proved  itself  to  be  but  a  film  of  irides- 
cence over  the  corruption  of  a  stagnant  pool. 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  73 

And,  sometimes,  thinking  over  all  these  things,  hear- 
ing no  voice  among  the  echoes,  seeing  no  prophet  amid 
the  waste,  hoping  for  little  deliverance  from  politi- 
cians or  from  priests,  it  sometimes  seems  to  me  as  if  a 
shadow  were  falling  over  us  as  over  Sicily  falls  the  dark 
shadow  of  her  volcano.  Of  this  at  any  rate  I  feel  very 
sure,  that  periods  of  long  prosperity  are  full  of  danger, 
and  that  the  attitude  of  moral  watchfulness  and  the  zeal 
of  a  noble  discontent  are  better  and  safer  than  the 
vanity  of  self-congratulation,  and  the  "  ghastly  smooth 
life,  dead  at  heart,"  of  a  merely  formal  and  merely 
nominal  religion.  "About  the  river  of  human  life,"  it 
has  been  said,  "  there  is  a  wintry  wind  and  a  heavenly 
sunshine.  The  rainbow  colors  its  agitation,  the  frost 
fixes  on  its  repose.  In  the  perils  of  nations,  in  their  in- 
fancy and  in  their  afflictions,  they  have  often  higher 
hopes  and  nobler  aspirations  ;  but  when  their  troubles 
have  sunk  to  rest,  there  are  evils  which  vex  less  but  in- 
jure more,  which  suck  the  blood  though  they  do  not 
shed  it,  and  ossify  the  heart  though  they  do  not  torture 
it;  and  there  is  danger  lest  enervation  succeed  to  energy, 
apathy  to  patience,  and  the  noise  of  jesting  words  and 
the  foulness  of  dark  thoughts  to  the  earnest  purity  of 
the  girded  loin  and  the  burning  lamp.  Let  us  not 
dwell  too  much  on  the  thought  how  religious,  how 
orthodox,  how  progressive,  how  safe  we  are.  Let  us 
rather  be  very  humble  for  our  many  sins  and  short- 
comings. For  if  we  be  like  Jerusalem,  if  we  too  fail  to 
know  the  day  of  our  visitation,  if  we  succumb  to  avarice 
and  immorality  and  unbelief,  for  us  also  a  voice  will  cry 
at  last  to  the  stem  angels  of  avenging  Justice,  "  Go  scat- 
ter the  drunkards  of  our  race,  and  those  who  tempt  and 


74    The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies. 


madden  them  ;  go  smite  the  selfish  hearts  which  are 
content  that  there  should  be  all  around  them  a  misery 
which  they  ignore,  and  burdens  which  they  will  not  lift 
with  one  of  their  fingers  ;  go  and  break  like  a  spidei-'s 
web  the  hope  of  the  hypocrite  ;  go  scatter  the  ignoble, 
and  the  false,  and  those  who  sacrifice  to  their  vilest  pas- 
sions the  souls  of  the  innocent  and  the  wretched."  And 
when  such  a  cry  is  heard,  "I  saw,"  says  one,  "I  saw  a 
brand  lifted  in  the  sombre  sky,  which  shone  from  east 
to  west  like  lightning,  and  from  the  abodes  of  men  there 
went  up  a  cry,  exceeding  great  and  bitter,  which  thrilled 
up  to  the  stars,  and  made  them  throb  and  tremble  as  in 
awe  and  fear.    And  then  the  earth  was  still." 

And  it  is  not  yet  too  late.  It  is  yet  the  day  of  our 
happy  visitation.  Even  at  the  eleventh  hour  repentance 
for  Jerusalem  would  have  been  possible.  She  might  yet 
have  hushed  upon  her  lips  the  fatal  cry,  "  We  have  no 
king  but  Caesar."  She  might  yet  have  paused  before 
she  preferred  her  Barabbas  to  her  Christ.  The  barren 
tree  might  yet  have  blossomed  into  fruitage.  The  axe 
was  at  its  backmost  poise,  but  even  yet,  ere  it  swept 
whistling  through  the  air,  the  watchers  and  the  holy 
ones  might  have  been  bidden  to  stay  the  stroke.  And 
our  day  has  not  yet  come.  It  may  yet  be  averted. 
England,  Canada,  America— the  English-speaking  race 
— are  yet  in  the  full  flood  of  prosperity.  We  may  yet 
have  before  us  a  future  splendid  and  beneficent,  rich  in 
that  righteousness  which  exalteth  nations,  because  it  is 
a  blessing  to  all  mankind.  May  God  grant  it !  And 
that  He  may  grant  it,  may  it  please  Him  to  inspire  us 
betimes  with  the  conviction  that  no  nation  can  be  great 
or  happy  unless  it  choose  the  Lord  for  its  God,  and 


The  Retribution  upon  Selfish  Societies.  75 

make  its  prime  care  to  obey  His  eternal  moral  laws.  And 
this  is  a  lesson  for  eacli  of  us,  as  for  us  all.  Nations 
only  become  great  and  happy  when  the  love  of  God 
burns,  like  a  pure  flame  upon  an  altar,  in  the  hearts  of 
their  individual  sons.  Ah  !  may  the  Lord  Christ  pour 
forth  His  spirit  upon  us  more  and  more,  and  make  us 
indeed  worthy,  or  at  least  more  worthy  of  the  high  name 
of  Christians.  May  He  make  us  feel  the  immense  pre- 
rogative, and  rise  to  the  full  height  of  the  immense 
responsibility  that  we  are  called  the  sons  of  God. 


SEEMON  VI. 


Peeached  en  St.  Paul's,  London,  Ontario,  Sept.  27, 1885. 


Clfte  ^Beatitude  of  jmen'js  mei)iUng» 


"  Blessed  are  ye  when  men  shall  revile  you  and  persecute  you, 
and  say  all  manner  of  evil  against  you  falsely,  for  my  sake." — Matt. 
V.  11. 

This  is  one  of  the  Beatitudes — so  startling  in  their 
divine  originality — with  which  our  Lord  began  His  Ser- 
mon on  the  Mount.  It  is  as  though  He  had  deliberately 
set  Himself  the  task  of  reversing  the  world's  Judgments  ; 
— of  declaring  those  blessed  whom  men  cursed,  and  those 
enviable  whom  men  pitied.  The  burden  of  the  Beati- 
tudes was — 

"  Glory  to  Grod  from  those  whom  men  oppress, 
Honor  from  God  to  those  whom  men  despise." 

The  world  prides  itself  on  its  passion  and  its  haughti- 
ness; — Christ  said,  "Blessed  are  the  poor  in  spirit." 
The  world  brands  as  coward  him  who  will  not  resent 
an  insult; — Christ  said,  "Blessed  are  the  meek."  The 
world  uses  the  word  "saint"  as  a  sneer; — Christ  said, 
"Blessed  are  they  that  hunger  and  thirst  after  right- 


The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling.  77 


eousness."  The  world  shouts  down  unpopular  names ; 
Christ  said,  "Blessed  are  ye  when  men  shall  reproach 
you,  and  persecute  you,  and  say  all  manner  of  evil 
against  you  falsely,  for  my  sake.  Kejoice  and  be  exceed- 
ing glad  :  for  great  is  your  reward  in  heaven  :  for  so  per- 
secuted they  the  prophets  which  were  before  you,"  aye, 
and  He  might  have  added,  the  prophets  who  shall  come 
after  you,  as  long  as  time  shall  be. 

1.  There  have  been  unceasing  attempts  to  explain 
away  these  Beatitudes,  to  treat  them  as  the  language  of 
exalted  enthusiasm,  to  tame  them  out  of  their  splendid 
passion,  to  rob  them  of  all  practical  significance,  to  re- 
gard them  only  as  paradoxes  in  the  regions  of  the  ideal. 
For  instance,  men  would  set  in  array  against  this  Beati- 
tude of  malediction  such  remarks  as,  "  If  a  man  is  ill- 
spoken  of,  he  generally  deserves  to  be  ill-spoken  of." 
"  Where  there  is  smoke  there  is  at  least  some  fire. "  "  He 
must  be  more  or  less  bad,  or  he  would  not  be  unpopular 
among  all  parties  alike."  Again  they  say,  "It  is  non- 
sense to  pretend  indifference  to  the  world's  opinion.  It 
only  proves  a  man's  self-conceit.  Nay,  more,  it  may 
come  from  the  effrontery  which  dares  to  brazen  out  bad 
deeds."  Again,  they  argue,  "Has  not  the  world  mostly 
shown  that  its  moral  judgments  are  sound  ?  Does  it  not 
execrate  great  crimes  ?  Has  it  not  shown  admiration 
for  unselfish  heroism  ?  What  becomes,  then,  of  the  be- 
atitude of  revilement  ?  Is  there  not  a  far  truer  and 
brighter  beatitude  in  enjoying  the  praise  of  men  ? 

2.  Now  there  is  a  certain  amount  of  superficial  truth 
in  these  observations.  There  are  certain  crimes  which 
are  dangerous  to  the  world,  and,  except  in  the  case  of 
gorgeous  criminals  and  successful  villains,  the  world 


78      The  Beatitude  of  Men's  Reviling. 

does  generally  condemn  sucli  crimes.  Again,  the  world 
is  often  right  in  its  posthumous  judgments, — because 
the  dead  do  not  stand  in  its  way,  awaken  no  envy,  ex- 
cite no  jealousy,  can  stir  up  no  personal  enmities.  The 
world's  judgment  of  the  dead  is,  therefore,  disentangled 
from  selfish  interests.  It  can  see  things  in  their  due 
perspective,  and  in  the  slow  history  of  their  ripening. 
And,  once  more,  popularity  is,  to  a  very  great  extent, 
an  accidental  thing,  and,  if  some  are  popular  who  fully 
deserve  to  be  so,  it  is  often  not  because  of  their  real  good- 
ness, but  because  of  qualities  which  they  may  share  with 
very  bad  men.  Nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  some 
of  the  most  worthless  men  who  have  ever  lived,  by  virtue 
of  a  pleasant  manner,  a  gay  indifference,  an  easy  good- 
nature, if  they  occupy  a  high  station,  may  excite,  and 
even  in  our  days  have  kindled,  a  perfect  frenzy  of  enthusi- 
asm among  shouting  multitudes  ;  and  that,  on  the  other 
hand,  some  of  the  very  best  and  noblest  of  God's  chil- 
dren who  have  ever  lived  may  be,  and,  even  in  our  own 
days,  have  been 

"  The  very  butt  of  slander." 

In  Roman  history  we  have  one  Emperor,  Nero,  the  first 
persecutor  of  Christianity,  who  stands  on  the  topmost 
pinnacle  of  immortal  infamy,  and  was  yet  so  popular 
that,  long  after  his  death,  his  grave  and  his  statues  used 
to  be  adorned  with  flowers,  and  emperor  after  emperor 
who  succeeded  him  strengthened  himself  by  honoring 
his  memory  and  imitating  his  vices ;  and  we  have  an- 
other Emperor,  Marcus  Aurelius,  perhaps  the  saintliest 
character  in  all  Pagan  and  in  much  of  even  Christian 
history,  who  was  so  conscious  that  by  the  people  around 


The  Beatitude  of  Men's  Reviling.  79 


him  he  was  not  beloved,  that,  in  the  little  golden  pas- 
sional of  his  private  diary,  which  breathes  sadness  in 
every  line,  he  writes :  "  I  am  going  away  from  a  life  in 
which  even  my  associates,  on  behalf  of  whom  I  have 
striven,  and  cared,  and  prayed  so  much,  themselves  wish 
me  to  depart.  .  .  .  Why,  then,  should  a  man  cling 
to  a  longer  stay  here  ?" 

3.  But  you  must  not  think  that  this  Beatitude  refers 
only  to  conspicuous  men,  or  to  times  of  persecution. 
Christ  was  speaking  to  the  obscure  and  humble  multi- 
tudes. In  their  measure.  His  words  apply  to  every  one 
of  us.  Be  we  gi-eat  or  small,  every  one  of  us  has  our 
little  world,  and  in  that  we  may  have  all  manner  of  evil 
said  against  us:  happy  if  this  be  "falsely;"  happier 
still  if  it  be  "for  Christ's  sake."  Our  Lord  said, 
"Judge  not,  that  ye  be  not  judged."  But  we  are  all 
judging,  and  being  judged,  daily,  and  all  day  long.  If 
we  occupy  a  position  which  attracts  the  smallest  notice, 
we  shall  find  it  surrounded  in  these  days  by  an  immense 
publicity,  a  base  and  empty  babble  of  the  thing  which 
calls  itself  society.  But  besides  this,  the  poorest  old 
woman,  the  clerk  in  the  oflBce,  the  shopman  behind  the 
counter,  even  the  school-boy  among  his  school-fellows, 
as  well  as  the  great  writer  or  the  great  statesman,  may 
know  what  it  is  to  suffer  from  "all  words  that  may  do 
hurt."  Just  as  they  may  be  popular  because  of  their 
lowest  qualities,  so  too  they  may  be  hated  simply  be- 
cause their  standard  and  their  language  is  more  virtuous 
and  more  pure  than  that  of  their  fellows.  Hatred  is 
the  commonest  tribute  which  Vice  pays  to  Virtue. 
Even  the  Pagan  statesman,  when  the  mob  applauded 
his  speech,  used  to  turn  round  and  ask  his  friends. 


8o      The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling. 


"Have  I  said  anything  wrong,  then?"  And  so  com- 
mon is  this  case  that  onr  Lord  said,  "Woe  unto  you 
when  all  men  shall  speak  well  of  you  ; "  "  Blessed  are  ye 
when  men  shall  say  all  manner  of  evil  against  you 
falsely,  for  my  sake."  He  said  "Blessed."  He  did  not 
say  "Happy."  The  two  things  are  very  different, 
though  the  world  does  not  see  the  distinction.  A  man 
can  hardly  be  happy  when  those  about  him  hate  him, 
and  are  unjust  to  him ;  but  he  may  be  very  blessed. 
Look  at  the  martyrs.  The  martyrs  shrank  from  suffer- 
ing like  other  men,  but  such  natural  shrinking  was  in- 
commensurable with  apostasy.  No  intensity  of  torture 
had  any  means  of  affecting  what  was  a  mental  convic- 
tion ;  and  the  sovereign  thought  in  which  they  had 
lived  was  their  adequate  support  and  consolation  in 
death.  Yes,  the  martyrs  were  blessed,  but  hardly 
happy;  and  their  blessedness — the  heritage  of  these 
divine  beatitudes,  a  thing  higher  and  deeper  and  more 
eternal  than  happiness — is  open  to  us  also  in  the  meas- 
ure that  we  tread  the  hard  path  of  the  Cross  of  Christ. 

4.  If  you  feel  any  doubt  on  the  subject,  look  at  the 
life  and  the  words  of  your  Master,  Christ.  Did  He  not 
say  to  some  who  were  not  His  disciples,  "The  world 
cannot  hate  you,  because  ye  are  not  of  the  world,  but 
Me  it  hateth?"  Did  He  not  say,  "Ye  shall  be  treated 
as  the  offscouring  of  all  things  for  my  name's  sake  ? " 
Is  the  world  so  changed — are  all  men  now  so  Christ-like 
— that  the  very  things  which  the  world  hated  in  Christ, 
it  will  love  in  Christians?  Christ  was  not  only  good, 
but  the  very  self  of  goodness ;  not  only  truthfulness,  but 
truth.  He  went  about  doing  good,  and  nothing  but 
good,  in  perfect  sinlessness.    What  came  thereof  ?  On 


The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling.  8i 


the  shining  Gabbatha,  the  rich  mosaic  on  which  stood 
the  Procurator's  gilded  chair,  stood  two  men.  One  is 
the  scowling  murderer,  whose  name  was  Jesus  Barabbas, 
who  had  been  imprisoned  for  sedition  and  for  murder. 
The  other  was  the  sinless  Son  of  God.  He  had  been 
tortured  by  nine  hours  of  trials,  and  derisions,  and  buf- 
fetings,  and  sleeplessness  ;  the  purple  robe  of  His  mock- 
ery hung  heavily  to  the  pavement,  with  blood  from  the 
awful  scourging  which  He  had  borne ;  twisted  round 
His  brow  was  the  wreath  of  agony,  its  leaves  encrimsoned 
with  the  rending  of  its  bitter  thorns.  They  stood  before 
the  world — those  two — the  Murderer,  and  the  Divine 
Man — before  the  world  assembled  in  myriads,  in  the  city 
which  called  itself  the  Holy  City.  There  were  Jews 
there,  and  Romans,  and  women  and  children,  and  chief 
priests.  Both  sexes ;  all  ages ;  many  nationalities ; 
men  of  every  class  were  represented  there.  The  choice 
is  given  to  them  all :  "  Which  will  ye  that  I  should  de- 
liver unto  you  ?"  Did  not  every  hand  point  to  the 
murderer?  Did  not  every  voice  shout  in  applause  the 
murderer's  name  ?  "  What  will  ye  then  that  I  should  do 
unto  Jesus  which  is  called  Christ  ?  "  Then  the  air  was 
rent  with  the  yell  of  "  Crucify  !  Crucify  the  Saviour ; 
the  Good  Physician ;  the  Good  Shepherd ;  the  Prince 
of  Peace.  Away,  away  with  Him  !  Crucify  !  Crucify  ! " 
And  they  nailed  Him  to  the  cross ;  and  even  there  the 
chief  priests  and  the  Jewish  mob,  and  the  Roman  sol- 
diers, and  the  crucified  robbers,  all  joined  in  taunts  of 
maledictions,  and  the  stream  which  flowed  before  the 
slowly-glazing  eyes  of  the  Redeemer  of  the  world  was  the 
muddy  and  the  shallow  stream  of  human  ferocity  and 

human  hate. 
6 


82      The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling. 


5.  Has  it  ever  been  otherwise  ?  Christ  said  the  dis- 
ciple shall  he  as  his  master,  and  He  bade  all  of  ns  His 
disciples  to  take  up  our  cross  and  follow  Him.  To  fol- 
low Him  is  to  live  virtuous,  and  true,  and  fearless,  and 
faithful  lives.  Have  these  lives — have,  or  have  they 
not,  inherited  the  beatitude  of  revilement  ?  I  will  but 
take  one  or  two  instances.  As  those  planets  shine  the 
brightest  which  are  nearest  to  the  sun,  so  no  life,  in  all 
the  annals  of  Christianity,  is  more  splendidly  luminous 
than  that  of  St.  Paul.  Now,  on  the  one  hand,  I  know 
no  life  in  all  the  world  which  was  so  heroic,  so  noble,  so 
absolutely  self-sacrificing  as  his ;  on  the  other,  I  know 
no  life  which  was  so  bitterly  hated,  so  remorselessly  per- 
secuted. It  was  not  only  the  world  which  hated  him, 
but,  as  has  often  been  the  case,  the  professedly  religious, 
the  nominal  Church.  The  Jews  again  and  again 
scourged  him ;  hunted  him  from  city  to  city  ;  vowed 
his  assassination  ;  plotted  against  his  life.  The  Gen- 
tiles scorned  him,  imprisoned  him,  beat  him  with  rods  ; 
at  last  murdered  him.  Even  the  infant  Cliurch,  for 
which  he  had  poured  out  his  life  like  water,  in  great 
measure  hated  him.  In  his  hour  of  need,  when  he  faced 
the  lion,  all  they  of  Asia — they  for  whose  sake  he  had 
braved  cold,  and  heat,  and  hunger,  and  agony — all  they 
of  Asia  forsook  him.  In  his  miserable  cell,  out  of  all 
that  Koman  Church,  he  had  but  a  single  friend.  To 
this  day  we  know  not  how  or  where  he  braved  the  mar- 
tyr's death.  As  the  world  judges  failure,  no  failure 
could  have  been  so  pitiable  and  so  absolute  as  that  of 
him  who,  of  all  men  since  Christ,  has  lived  the  most 
Christ-like  life.  Even  two  centuries  after  his  martyr- 
dom he  was  basely  slandered,  in  writings  avowedly 


The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling. 


Christian,  under  the  thin  pseudonym  of  Simon  Magus. 
Hatred,  slander,  abuse,  perils  of  every  kind,  beatings, 
scourgings,  cold,  hunger,  nakedness,  murder,  the  long 
bitterness  alike  of  contemporary  and  of  posthumous 
calumny — this  was  the  world's  reward  for  the  man 
who,  next  to  his  Lord,  was  the  founder  of  Christianity. 
Think  you  that  this  high  saint  of  God,  in  the  long 
martyrdom  of  his  life,  was  never  comforted  by  Christ's 
beatitude  :  "Blessed  are  ye  when  men  shall  revile  you 
and  persecute  you  for  my  sake  ?  " 

6.  We  have  seen  how  religious  Jerusalem  and  how 
Pagan  Kome  rewarded  the  saints  of  God.  Let  us  leap 
over  two  centuries,  and  come  to  philosophic  and  Christ- 
ian Alexandria.  If  you  were  to  ask  who  was  the  most 
apostolic  man  since  the  Apostles?  who  was  the  most 
learned  and  most  holy  of  all  the  Fathers  ?  who,  since 
St.  John  died,  has  rendered  greater  services  than  any 
man  who  has  ever  lived  to  the  cause  of  Scriptural  knowl- 
edge, any  candid  student  of  church  history,  if  he  knew 
anything  of  his  subject,  would  answer,  "  That  man  was 
Origen."  Now  it  is  precisely  this  man — in  spite  of  all 
his  holiness,  in  spite  of  a  life  of  martyrdom  begun  in 
early  boyhood  and  continued  till  he  succumbed  to  the 
effects  of  hideous  torture  in  the  Decian  persecution — it 
is  precisely  this  holy  and  most  gifted  saint  of  God  who 
most  of  all  men  experienced  Christ's  beatitude  of  male- 
diction. The  Christians  persecuted  him  even  more 
shamefully  and  more  bitterly  than  the  heathen.  The 
Pharisaic  viper  was  scotched,  not  killed.  Almost  every 
saint  of  God  who  has  dared  to  think  for  himself  has 
heard  its  hiss.  Origen,  all  his  life  long,  was  a  victim  of 
religious  malice.    Nor  did  this  his  martyrdom  end  with 


84     The  Beatitude  of  Men's  Reviling. 


his  death.  Though  the  best  Fathers  spoke  of  him  with 
respectful  gratitude,  the  cause  of  his  enemies  prevailed. 
In  the  writings  of  all  the  emptiest  and  pettiest  repeaters 
of  second-hand  formulse  he  is  execrated  as  "the  in- 
sane," "the  impious,"  " the  heretical "  Origen.  Well 
may  even  the  secular  historian  say  of  him  that,  if  in  the 
midst  of  saints  and  angels,  and  in  the  hands  of  their 
Creator,  such  souls  as  his  be  conscious  of  what  passes 
here,  "  they  must  smile  at  the  idle  fury  of  the  theologi- 
cal insects  who  still  crawl  on  the  surface  of  the  earth." 
It  is  only  after  the  lapse  of  fifteen  centuries  that  due 
justice  is  beginning  to  be  done  to  that  glorious  name ; 
but  he,  we  are  very  sure,  has  long  ago  experienced  in  all 
its  fulness  the  divine  prediction  :  "  Blessed  are  ye  when 
men  shall  revile  you  and  persecute  you,  and  say  all 
manner  of  evil  against  you  falsely,  for  my  name's  sake." 

7.  But  perhaps  the  world  and  the  Church  grow  kind- 
er and  more  just  as  the  Christian  centuries  roll  on  ? 
Well,  we  will  pass,  at  one  beat  of  the  wing,  over  some 
twelve  Christian  centuries,  and  come  this  time  to  Ger- 
many, and  to  one  who  died  more  than  450  years  ago. 
In  a  rude  wooden  carriage,  still  preserved,  a  poor 
Bohemian  preacher  was  brought,  by  the  order  of  an 
infamous  Pope,  to  the  great  Council  of  Constance.  His 
name  was  John  Huss.  In  spite  of  the  pledged  safe- 
conduct  of  the  Emperor  Sigismund,  he  was  thrust  into 
a  miserable  prison-cell,  where  you  may  still  see  the  stone 
to  which  he  was  chained,  and  the  hole  through  which 
food  was  passed  to  him.  In  vain,  in  the  full  council, 
before  all  the  spiritual  and  temporal  lords,  he  made  the 
hot  blush  burn  on  the  cheek  of  the  Emperor  Sigismund 
by  reminding  him  of  his  violated  word,    A  hundred 


The  Beatitude  of  Men's  Reviling.  85 


years  afterwards  that  blush  saved  the  life  of  Luther,  for 
when  Charles  V.  was  urged  to  seize  Luther  in  spite  of 
his  safe-conduct,  he  replied,  "  I  do  not  want  to  blush 
like  Sigismund."  It  saved  Martin  Luther  a  century 
afterwards,  but  it  did  not  save  John  Huss  then.  Like 
Paul,  in  the  misery  of  loneliness,  tormented  by  cold  and 
wet,  he  waited  to  be  led  from  cruel  prison  to  agonizing 
death.  Princes,  prelates,  priests,  visitors  to  the  num- 
ber of  100,000,  had  come  to  the  council.  From  none  of 
them  did  he  receive  pity.  Charged  with  opinions  which 
he  had  never  maintained,  his  appeal,  "How  can  I 
adjure  what  I  never  held  ?"  was  drowned  in  insolent 
clamor.  When  the  sentence  of  death  was  read  to  him, 
he  fell  on  his  knees  and  prayed,  "Lord  Jesus,  forgive 
my  enemies,  and  their  false  accusations."  How  was 
that  prayer  received  ?  Loud  laughter  rang  from  the 
assembled  bishops,  as  that  prayer  went  up  for  them  to 
heaven  !  When  he  was  degraded  from  the  priesthood, 
a  cap  painted  with  devils  was  put  on  his  head. 

Within  a  railing  lies  a  huge  boulder,  overgrown  with 
ivy.  On  that  stone,  in  his  robe  of  infamy,  with  "Arch- 
heretic  "  written  in  large  letters  on  his  devil-painted 
cap,  the  martyr  stood.  Among  those  who  crowded  to 
witness  his  death,  a  wretched  old  woman,  thinking  that 
the  act  would  secure  her  salvation,  eagerly  stooped 
down  to  lay  another  fagot  on  the  pile.  The  martyr 
smiled  at  her  ignorant  ferocity  and  brutal  religionism  ; 
but,  "  0  sancta  simpUcita,"  "  Oh,  holy  simplicity," 
— that  was  all  he  said.  "  Jesus,  Son  of  the  living  God, 
have  mercy  on  me,"  he  cried,  until  the  wind  fanned  the 
flames  into  his  face  and  so  stifled  his  voice.  Now  why 
did  all  the  world  combine  to  execrate  him  as  a  man. 


86      The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling. 

and  to  bum  him  as  a  heretic  ?  Partly  because,  being  a 
better  man  than  any  in  his  age,  he  had  denounced  the 
■wickedness  and  laxity  alike  of  the  clergy  and  the  laity  ; 
partly  because,  when  men  were  still  sunk  in  ignorance 
and  superstition,  he  held  and  maintained  the  very  truths 
which  we  in  our  church  believe  to  be  the  dearest  and 
the  best.  And  this  incomparable  martyr  of  the  dawning 
Keformation — this  man  whose  conscience  was  so  deli- 
cately sensitive  that  the  chief  fault  with  which  he  had 
to  reproach  himself  was  that,  before  he  became  a  priest, 
he  used  sometimes  to  get  angry  over  the  game  of  chess — 
this  man  who  "  dared  to  be 

In  the  right  with  two  or  three ; " 

who  "  dared  to  choose 

Hatred,  slander,  and  abuse, 

Rather  than  in  silence  shrink 

Prom  the  thing  he  needs  must  think  " — 

when  put  to  death  for  this  by  bishops  and  princes,  wrote 
from  his  prison,  "  in  chains,  on  the  vigil  of  St,  John, 
who,  because  he  rebuked  wickedness,  was  beheaded  in 
prison,"  "  Much  consoles  me  that  word  of  our  Saviour, 
Blessed  be  ye  when  men  shall  hate  you,  and  separate 
you  from  their  company,  and  cast  out  your  name  as 
evil,  for  the  Son  of  Man's  sake." 

"When  the  wicked  perish  there  is  shouting,"  says 
Solomon ;  aye,  but  very  often  the  good,  too,  have  been 
shouted  out  of  the  world.  "I'll  go  curse,"  exclaims 
the  furious  Duchess  in  one  of  our  English  tragedies ; 
"I  could  curse  the  stars."  "Look  you,"  answers  one 
who  hears  her,  "  the  stars  shine  still."  Aye,  the  stars 
of  God  shine  still,  though  the  world  curse  and  try  to 


The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling,  87 


quench  them  ;  and  the  exhalations  die  away  in  mephitic 
gleam,  though  the  world  shout  its  admiration  at  their 
light ! 

8.  I  will  take  but  one  instance  more.  Again  I  pass 
over  two  centuries,  and  this  time  I  will  take  an  instance, 
not  from  the  Church,  but  from  the  State.  Not  far 
from  Westminster  Abbey,  250  years  ago,  in  poverty  and 
loneliness,  in  blindness  and  persecution,  lived  one  of  the 
greatest  poets,  and  one  of  the  noblest  men  whom  the 
world  has  ever  seen — John  Milton.  All  his  life  long  he 
had  combated  for  the  truth  and  the  liberty  which  he 
loved  more  than  life  itself.  He  had  made  his  whole  life 
a  poem.  By  pureness  and  by  knowledge  he  had  striven 
to  winnow  his  age  from  its  gathered  draflf.  Even  in 
youth  not  religion  only,  but  a  certain  delicate  and 
fastidious  nobleness  had  kept  the  crystal  of  his  soul 
unflawed  and  unsullied  by  every  sensual  or  ignoble  vice. 
His  years  had  been  devoted,  from  his  beautiful  child- 
hood upwards,  to  holy  efforts  and  fruitful  studies.  All 
had  seemed  to  fail.  His  friends  had  died  in  exile  or  in 
prison.  He  could  not  walk  over  Westminster  Bridge 
without  seeing  on  a  pike  the  ghastly  head  of  the  great 
Lord  Protector,  whom  he  had  loved  and  honored.  And 
never  man  was  so  hated  as  he.  You  will  remember 
how,  in  Sir  Walter  Scott's  fine  tale  of  "Woodstock," 
where  Everett  has  quoted  to  the  old  knight  the  beauti- 
ful lines, 

"  Oh  welcome,  pure-eyed  Faith,  white-handed  Hope, 
Thou  hovering  angel  girt  with  golden  wings, 
And  thou,  unblemished  form  of  chastity  " — 

and  Charles  II.  tells  him  that  the  lines  which  he  has  ad- 


88      The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling. 

mired  so  much  are  by  John  Milton,  the  old  cavalier 
bursts  out  into  a  torrent  of  imprecations,  calling  him  the 
blasphemous  and  bloody-minded,  a  whitened  sepulchre, 
the  sophist  Milton.  The  scene  is  most  true  to  his- 
tory. When  on  a  statue  of  the  now-forgotten  poet, 
John  Phillips,  was  cai-ved  the  line  that  he  was  "  nearly 
equal  to  Milton,"  it  was  obliterated  by  the  order  of  the 
then  Dean,  Bishop  Sprat,  because  he  considered  the 
name  of  Milton  a  pollution  to  the  Abbey  walls. 

But  blessed  are  ye  when  all  men  shall  persecute  you, 
and  speak  all  manner  of  evil  against  you  falsely,  for  my 
name's  sake.  "  Fools  accounted  his  life  madness,  and  his 
end  to  be  without  honoi',  how  is  he  numbered  among 
the  children  of  God,  and  his  lot  is  among  the  saints." 
Where  there  is  a  great  soul  uttering  new  and  needed 
truths,  there  for  the  most  part  is  Calvary  ;  and  the  prog- 
ress of  good  and  of  good  men  in  the  world,  has  been 
from  scaffold  to  scaffold  and  from  stake  to  stake. 

9.  And  what  shall  I  more  say  ?  for  the  time  would 
fail  me  to  tell  of  St.  Chrysostom,  orator,  and  patriarch, 
and  saint,  driven  out  of  Constantinople  to  perish  in 
cruel  exile  ;  of  Columbus,  dying  in  obscurity,  his  room 
hung  with  the  chains  in  which  he  had  been  sent  back 
from  the  New  World  which  he  had  discovered ;  of 
Gregory  the  Great  exclaiming,  "I  have  loved  righteous- 
ness and  hated  iniquity,  and  therefore  I  die  in  exile  ; " 
of  Campanella,  seven  times  cruelly  tortured  for  the  love 
of  liberty,  and  tolerance,  and  truth  ;  of  the  English 
martyrs  who  perished  in  the  flames  which  Bonner  and 
Mary  lit ;  of  Whitfield,  who 

"  Stood  pilloried  on  infamy's  high  stage, 
And  bore  the  pelting  scorn  of  half  an  age 


The  Beatitude  of  Men's  Reviling. 


of  Priestly,  whom  "full  of  years  from  his  loved  native 
land,"  statesmen  bloodstained  and  priests  idolatrous, 

"  With  fierce  lies  maddening  the  blind  multitude, 
Drove  with  vain  hate  ; " 

of  the  men  of  yesterday  who  have  sunk  into  their  graves 
weary,  as  Melancthon  was,  of  "the  rage  of  theologians," 
and  of  the  strife  of  base  tongues ;  of  the  men  of  to-day 
for  whom  life  is  burdened  with  "the  oppression  of  a  per- 
petual reviling."  Strangers  and  pilgrims,  the  noblest  of 
earth,  have  been,  and  they  have  trodden  the  path  of 
their  pilgrimage,  like  their  Lord  before  them,  with  bare 
feet  and  bleeding  brow.  Darkness  has  often  been  around 
them  with  nothing  but  faith  to  brighten  it.  Destitute, 
ajfflicted,  tormented,  of  whom  the  world  was  not  worthy, 
they  received  not  indeed  on  earth  the  promise,  but  they 
did  experience  the  divine  beatitude  :  "  Blessed  are  ye 
when  men  shall  revile  you,  and  persecute  you,  and  say 
all  manner  of  evil  against  you  falsely  for  my  sake.  Ee- 
joice  and  be  exceeding  glad,  for  great  is  your  reward  in 
heaven." 

10.  Only  let  me  point  out,  in  one  last  word,  that  for 
this  beatitude  there  are  two  conditions.  The  abuses, 
the  reproach,  the  reviling  must  be  false,  not  true  ;  the 
suffering  and  persecution  must  be  borne  for  Christ's 
sake,  not  for  our  own.  And  that  implies  that,  from 
the  world's  judgment,  we  have  two  tribunals  to  appeal 
unto — ourselves,  and  God. 

i.  Ourselves.  You  are  unpopular,  you  are  not  loved, 
you  are  ill-spoken  of?  Well,  but  does  this  sea  of  en- 
mity without,  meet  the  sea  of  guilt  from  your  heart 
within?   Does  no  awful  inner  voice  confirm,  as  with 


90      The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling. 

crash  on  crash,  of  thunder,  the  angry  verdict  of  the 
world  ?  Can  you  go  up  into  the  tribunal  of  your  own 
conscience,  and  setting  yourself  before  yourself,  say  with 
David,  "I  have  washed  my  hands  in  innocency,  and  so 
have  I  come  to  thine  altar,  oh  Lord."  Can  you  say 
with  Moses,  "I  have  not  taken  one  ass  from  them, 
neither  have  I  hurt  one  of  them."  Can  you  say  with 
Samuel,  "Behold,  here  I  am  :  witness  against  me  before 
the  Lord,  whom  I  have  defrauded  ?  whom  have  I  op- 
pressed ?  "  Can  you  say  with  Job,  "  Thou  knowest  that 
I  am  not  wicked.  My  foot  hath  kept  thy  steps."  Can 
you  say  with  Paul,  "I  know  nothing  against  myself?" 
Ah  !  if  you  cannot — if,  in  your  own  secret  heart,  there 
are  deeds  for  which  to  blush — if  in  your  own  heart  there 
be  not  only  the  judge  and  jury,  but  also  the  prisoner  at 
the  bar,  ever  condemned ;  then  that  will  indeed  drag 
down  your  life.  There  is  no  consolation  then  against 
the  deserved  scorn  of  the  world.  But,  if  you  can  stand 
up  and  say,  "I  have  injured  none;  I  have  slandered 
none  ;  I  have  corrupted  none  ;  I  have  defrauded  none  ; 
I  have  been  honest  in  my  dealings  ;  I  have  been  truth- 
ful in  my  words ;  I  have  had  clean  hands,  and  I  have 
striven  to  have  a  pure  heart,  and  I  have  cast  no  stum- 
bling-block of  my  own  guilty  passion  before  any  man, 
or  woman,  or  child  for  whom  Christ  died ; "  if  you 
can  say,  with  a  living  writer,  "I  have  been  kind  to 
many ;  I  have  wished  to  be  kind  to  all ;  I  have  never 
willingly  done  the  slightest  wrong  to  any  ;  I  have  loved 
much,  and  not  unselfishly,  and  therefore  the  light  of 
heaven  is  still  bright  for  me  on  yonder  hills ; "  if  you 
can  say  this,  then  acquitted  at  the  bar  of  conscience, 
be  just  and  fear  not ;  stand  up,  not  only  undaunted  but 


The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling.  91 


superior  before  any  amount  of  misconception,  or  any 
multitude  of  lies. 

"  'Tis  not  the  babbling  of  an  idle  world, 
Where  praise  and  censure  are  at  random  hurled, 
That  can  the  meanest  of  my  thoughts  control, 
Or  shake  one  settled  purpose  of  my  soul ; 
Free  and  at  large  might  their  wild  curses  roam 
If  all,  alas  1  if  all  were  well  at  home  I " 

ii.  And  can  you  appeal  fearlessly  to  the  Judgment  of 
God?  Can  you  say  with  David,  "God,  thou  knowest 
my  sinfulness,  and  my  thoughts  are  not  hid  from 
thee  ?  "  When  Savonarola  was  unfrocked  before  the 
yelling  mobs  of  Florence,  the  bishop  said,  "I  degrade 
you  from  the  Church."  "From  the  Church  militant 
you  may,"  said  the  great  preacher,  "from  the  Church 
triumphant  you  cannot :  it  is  not  yours  to  do."  When 
Huss  had  the  cap  painted  with  demons  placed  upon  his 
head  by  the  heads  of  the  bishops  of  his  day,  they  said, 
"We  devote  your  soul  to  the  infernal  devils."  "And 
I,"  replied  the  martyr,  "I  commend  my  redeemed  soul 
to  Thee,  oh  Lord,  my  Christ."  When  Pascal  was 
fiercely  condemned  by  the  Jesuits  for  heresy,  he  wrote  : 
"  If  what  I  have  here  written  be  condemned  at  Eome, 
what  I  there  condemn  is  condemned  in  heaven.  Ad 
tuum  Dominie  Jesu,  tribunal  appello.  Among  the 
Marian  martyrs  was  one  poor  boy  named  William 
Brown.  He  was  burnt  at  Brentwood.  "  Pray  for  me," 
he  said  to  the  bystanders.  "I  will  pray  no  more  for 
thee,"  one  of  them  replied,  "than  I  will  pray  for  a 
dog."  "  Then,"  said  William,  "  Son  of  God  shine  thou 
upon  me  ! "  and  lo  !  at  once,  on  a  dark  and  cloudy  day, 
the  sunshine  burst  forth  full  upon  him,  and  kindled  a 


92      The  Beatitude  of  Mens  Reviling. 

glory  upon  his  youthful  face,  "whereat  the  people 
mused  because  it  was  so  dark  a  little  time  before." 
Happy  they  on  whom  the  Son  of  God  shall  thus  smile, 
not  only  in  a  flood  of  earthly  sunshine  amid  the  clouds 
and  storms  of  persecution,  but  as  in  that  city  which 
hath  no  need  of  the  sun,  neither  of  the  moon  to  lighten 
it,  for  the  glory  of  God  doth  lighten  it,  and  the  Lamb  is 
the  light  thereof !  Earthly  friends  may  fail ;  wealth 
may  fail ;  health  may  fail ;  kindness  may  fail ;  fame 
may  vanish  away ;  failure  may  attend  our  efforts ;  all 
men  may  hate,  and  revile,  and  persecute  us  ;  there  may 
be  none  so  poor  to  do  us  reverence.  The  world  may 
give  to  a  saint  the  poison-cup  when  he  has  earned  the 
crown — but  no  good  man  needs  the  pity,  but  rather  the 
envy  of  the  world  whose  sins  he  rebukes  and  thwarts. 

"Hath  he  not  always  treasures,  always  friends, 
The  good,  great  man  ?   Three  treasures,  life,  and  light, 

And  calm  thoughts,  regular  as  infants'  breath ; 
And  three  firm  friends,  more  sure  than  day  and  night, 
Himself,  his  Maker,  and  the  Angel  Death." 


SERMON  VII. 

Preached  in  St.  Paul's,  Baltimore,  Md.,  Oct.  3,  1885. 


"Rejoice  with  me,  for  I  have  found  my  sheep  which  was  lost." 
— Luke  xv.  C. 

I  WISH  this  morning  to  speak  to  you  a  few  simple 
words  on  the  lesson  of  the  day.  It  imperatively  claims 
our  attention  because  it  reveals  with  the  most  absolute 
and  incisive  plainness  the  love  of  God — the  love  of  God 
in  Christ — for  lost  and  wandering  souls. 

1.  In  fulfilment  of  His  high  mission,  which  was  to 
the  lost  sheep  of  the  House  of  Israel — to  the  sick,  who 
needed,  and  knew  that  they  needed,  a  Physician — Jesus 
had  "received  sinners  and  eaten  with  them."  It  was 
His  special  characteristic  to  love  those  whom  none  had 
loved,  and  to  love  them  as  none  had  ever  loved  before. 
Those  whom  the  Priests  wholly  failed  to  reach  by  their 
officialism.  He  reached ;  those  whom  Scribes  failed  to 
move  by  their  learning,  or  Pharisees  by  their  ortho- 
doxy. He  moved  to  the  depths  of  their  sad  and  guilty 
souls.  The  chill  wind  may  play  about  the  Alpine 
heights,  but  it  only  congeals  them  into  a  deadlier  and 


94 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


more  frozen  whiteness;  but  when  they  thrill  to  the 
touch  of  the  sunbeam  and  the  breathing  of  the  West- 
ern wind,  the  snow  is  melted  and  loosed,  till  from  the 
burdened  bosom  of  the  mountain  it  slips  away  in  aya- 
lanche,  and  where  yesterday  the  slopes  were  blank  and 
perilous,  to-day  there  is  green  grass  and  purple  flower. 
So  is  it  with  the  human  heart.  Coldness  and  fierceness 
will  not  touch  it ;  it  will  be  only  hardened  by  contempt 
and  anathema ;  it  may  be  broken,  not  swayed,  by  au- 
thority and  domination  ;  but  there  never  yet  was  human 
heart  so  hard  as  not  to  be  thrilled  and  melted  by  sym- 
pathy and  love. 

3.  That  was  Christ's  way  ;  and  the  religious  world  of 
Palestine  did  not  understand  it.  They  broke  into  loud 
murmurs  of  disapprobation  as  they  saw  crowd  after 
crowd  of  publicans  and  sinners  drawing  near  unto 
Him  to  hear  Him.  They  were  jealously  indignant 
that  these  disreputable  persons  from  whom  they  could 
gain  no  hearing  thronged  to  one  whom  they  called  "the 
Son  of  the  carpenter,"  who  had  not  been  to  their  schools, 
who  did  not  respect  their  traditions,  who  saw  through 
their  conventionality,  "who  knew  no  letters,"  they  said, 
"having  never  learned."  When  they  met  these  people 
in  the  streets  they  drew  in  their  ample  robes  lest,  in 
passing,  they  should  touch  them  ;  they  spoke  of  them 
with  angry  hatred  as  "this  multitude  which  knoweth 
not  the  law,  and  are  accursed."  They  could  under- 
stand John  the  Baptist's  way  with  them ;  they  could 
not  understand  the  secret  of  Jesus.  To  withdraw  into 
the  desert — to  shake  off  from  saintly  feet  the  dust  of 
common  life — to  say,  "  Stand  aside,  for  I  am  holier 
than  thou  " — the  ascetic,  the  theological,  the  exclusive 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


95 


way  of  regarding  sinners — that  they  could  approve ; 
and  if  John  had  not  hurled  his  apocalyptic  denuncia- 
tions at  them  even  more  loudly  than  at  the  people,  they 
would  have  welcomed  him  with  open  arms  as  a  prophet 
and  a  saint.  If  they  said  that  "  he  had  a  devil,"  it  was 
only  because — being  too  great  and  too  true  not  to 
despise  the  religious  popularity  which  he  might  have 
gained  by  floating  down  the  stream  of  the  prevalent 
opinions — he  exposed  their  externalism  and  opinion- 
worship  with  unsparing  vehemence.  But  they  could 
not  understand  Christ's  way  at  all.  For  they  were  the 
religious  world — there  could  be  no  doubt  about  that — 
and  yet  Christ  looked  coldly  on  them  !  They  tithed  even 
their  mint,  anise,  and  cumin,  and  He  did  not  praise 
them  ;  they  used  all  the  proper  ablutions ;  they  wore 
all  the  bluest  fringes  and  the  broadest  phylacteries, 
and  Christ  thought  nothing  of  them  !  As  touching 
the  righteousness  which  is  by  the  law,  they  were  blame- 
less, and  lo  !  He  had  no  single  word  of  commendation  for 
their  scrupulosities  !  Nay,  after  experiencing  for  a  time 
their  treacherous  friendship  and  subterranean  hostili- 
ties, turning  His  back  upon  them  altogether,  striving 
no  longer  to  remove  their  prejudices  or  to  conciliate 
their  malice,  the  Saviour  had  gathered  round  Him  the 
outcast  and  the  reprobate — the  wretched  women,  the 
sinners,  and  the  masses  at  whom  they  spat  and  sneered. 
"  How  mischievous,"  they  said,  "is  this  despiser  of  or- 
thodoxy, this  religious  leveller  and  innovator  ! "  His 
ways  were  not  their  ways ;  nor  His  thoughts  their 
thoughts  ;  nor  His  righteousness  their  righteousness. 
Their  religion  was  a  religion  of  party,  of  opinion,  of 
observances,  of  hatred  ;  His  religion  was  love. 


96 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


3.  Now  it  was  to  make  quite  clear  to  these  mnrmiTr- 
ing  Scribes  and  Pharisees  something  of  His  desires  and 
of  His  method,  that  the  Lord  Jesus  spake  to  them  the 
three  parables  which  give  to  this  chapter  so  inestimably 
a  preciousness — the  parables  of  the  Lost  Sheep,  of  tbe 
Lost  Coin,  of  the  Lost  Son.  They  are  rich  with  many 
meanings,  which,  like  the  colors  of  the  rainbow,  melt 
into  each  other.  We  could  not  pretend  in  many  ser- 
mons to  exhaust  or  fathom  their  divine  depth.  There 
must  be  much  uncertainty  about  many  of  their  details  ; 
but  one  truth  is  common  to  all  three  of  them,  and  in 
speaking  of  it  we  go  straight  to  the  heart  of  their  cen- 
tral significance ; — and  that  is  the  infinite  yearning  of 
redemptive  love. 

4.  To  illustrate  this,  Christ  chooses  three  different 
images  to  represent  three  different  kinds  of  sinners  : 

i.  The  sheep  wanders  from  its  flock  and  from  its  fold  ; 
it  is  lost  in  the  pathless  wilderness ;  it  is  endangered 
by  wild  beasts ;  it  is  torn  by  briers  ;  it  is  hungry  and 
thirsty.  But  alas !  the  way  is  lost.  No  help  is  near. 
There  is  no  one  to  lead  it  back  again.  It  has  chosen 
the  delusions  of  the  mirage  for  the  green  pastures  and 
still  waters,  and  they  have  but  lured  it,  farther  and 
farther,  over  the  sun-encrimsoned  sands.  The  lost 
sheep  is  the  bewildered  sinner — the  soul  which,  in 
ignorance  and  indifference,  has  wandered  from  its 
Shepherd's  care. 

ii.  Then  there  is  the  lost  coin.  It  is  of  silver  ;  it 
bears  the  image  of  a  king ;  but  it  lies  defaced,  down- 
trodden, in  the  dust,  in  some  dark  lurking-place  to 
which  it  has  rolled ;  useless,  dishonored — but,  like  a 
dead  thing,  unheeding  of  its  loss.    The  lost  coin  is  the 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


97 


ignorant,  the  unconscious,  the  neglected  sinner,  who 
must  be  diligently  searched  for,  or  he  can  never  be  re- 
claimed. 

iii.  Then  there  is  the  lost  son  ;  the  dear,  dear  son, 
who  has  wilfully  left  his  father's  home  ;  who  has  known 
what  love  is,  and  despised  its  solicitude  ;  he  who,  to 
indulge  in  his  spurious  liberty,  has  cared  nothing  for 
his  mother's  bitter  tears,  or  his  father's  breaking  heart ; 
he  who  has  followed  into  the  bad  far  country  the  phan- 
toms of  false  pleasure  and  corrupt  desires,  there  to 
waste  his  substance  in  riotous  living.  The  prodigal  son 
is  the  voluntary  sinner  ;  the  worst  sinner  of  all ;  the 
sinner  against  light  and  knowledge  ;  the  sinner  against 
home  and  love.  Here,  then,  are  three  different  speci- 
mens of  lost  souls.  And  yet — so  Jesus  taught — not  one 
of  these  is  beyond  the  love  of  God. 

5.  Doubtless  among  the  poor  groups  who  kept  throng- 
ing to  Jesus  were  specimens  of  each  class — men  and 
women,  perplexed  and  wandering,  or  unconscious  in 
their  misery,  or  wilful  in  their  degradation.  And  that 
was  why  when  He  saw  them  He  had  compassion  on 
them,  because  they  were  as  sheep  not  having  a  shepherd. 
Scattered  in  the  wilderness  and  on  the  barren  hills,  in 
the  cloudy  and  dark  day,  there  were  none  to  search  for 
them.  In  all  that  accurate  orthodox  Church — in  that 
squabbling,  self-absorbed,  religious  world — there  were 
none  really  or  wisely  to  pity  them.  Alas !  were  they 
not  like  the  swarming  masses  in  many  of  our  great 
towns  ?  Was  it  only  in  Palestine  that  there  were 
souls  of  men  and  women  wandering  in  evil  paths, 
lost  in  their  degradation,  self-exiled  from  God  and 

home  ?    And  to  all  three  classes,  as  the  Lord  wished 
7 


98 


The  Lost  Sheep, 


them  to  know,  and  would  also  have  the  Pharisees 
know,  His  one  rule  was  the  rule  of  love.  He  would 
bring  back  the  lost  sheep  from  the  wilderness.  He 
would  find  the  lost  coin.  To  the  returning  prodigal 
He  would  open  wide  the  arms  of  His  mercy.  He  would 
teach  all  self-righteous  partisans  that  it  is  not  the  will 
of  our  Father  in  Heaven  that  one  of  His  little  ones 
should  perish,  but  that  all  should  come  to  repentance. 
He  was  the  kind  owner  of  the  flock  who  would  find  the 
wandering  sheep.  He  was  the  careful  searcher  who 
would  look  for  the  lost  coin.  He  was  the  loving  Father 
who,  forgiving  the  lost,  wilful  youth,  so  miserable,  so 
disenchanted,  so  ragged,  so  hungry,  and  so  changed, 
would  welcome  him  back  with  the  fatted  calf  to  the  dear 
home  he  had  despised. 

6.  Let  the  first  of  these  parables  suffice  to  illustrate 
to-day  the  one  central  idea  of  the  three.  It  is  a  beauti- 
ful sight  to  see  the  shepherd  in  Palestine  sitting  amid 
his  flock,  or  walking  with  his  staff,  while  in  long  line 
his  sheep  follow  him.  He  loves  his  sheep,  and  lives 
with  them.  He  shares  with  them  the  burning  of  the 
sun  by  day  and  the  smiting  of  the  moon  by  night.  He 
calls  them  by  their  names.  He  does  not  flee  when  he 
seeth  the  wolf  coming.  David,  when  he  was  but  a  ruddy 
shepherd  lad,  faces  and  slays,  for  the  sake  of  his  few 
poor  sheep  in  the  wilderness,  both  the  lion  and  the  bear. 
To  leave  the  rest  of  the  flock  with  others,  while  he  goes 
himself  to  seek  but  one  that  has  gone  astray,  is  the  first 
instinct  of  the  true  shepherd.  You  have  heard  the 
story  of  Garibaldi,  the  simple  hero  of  Italy,  in  his  island 
home  ;  how  he  went  with  his  shepherds  to  seek  a  lost 
lamb  in  Caprera,  but  not  finding  it,  dismissed  them  at 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


99 


nightfall.  But  he  himself  ceased  not  to  search,  and 
through  the  lone,  dreary  night  he  searched  on  until  he 
had  rescued  it,  and  in  the  morning  was  found  sleeping 
for  weariness  with  the  lost  lamb  sleeping  by  his  side. 
How  has  the  witchery  of  music  added  for  us  a  fresh 
charm  to  the  tender  words  of  prophecy,  "  He  shall  feed 
His  flock  like  a  shepherd  ;  He  shall  gather  the  lambs 
in  His  arm,  and  carry  them  in  His  bosom,  and  shall 
gently  lead  those  that  are  with  young  !  "  And  how 
lovely  is  Christ's  image  here  !  He  leaves  the  ninety  and 
nine  for  the  perishing  one.  Ah,  how  will  the  mother's 
heart  understand  that  love  !  Her  other  boys  are  safe 
and  happy  in  the  fold,  but  if  she  have  one  prodigal, 
wherever  he  is  her  heart  is  there.  The  Good  Shep- 
herd's heart  aches  to  think  of  the  wretchedness  and  peril 
of  his  lost  sheep  : 

"  There  were  ninety  and  nine  that  safely  lay 

In  the  shelter  of  the  fold  ; 
But  one  was  on  the  hills  away, 

Par  ofE  from  the  gates  of  gold — 
Away  on  the  mountain,  wild  and  bare, 
Par  off  from  the  tender  shepherd's  care  I 

*  *  «  * 

But  none  of  the  ransomed  ever  knew 

How  deep  were  the  waters  crossed, 
Nor  how  dark  was  the  night  the  Lord  passed  through 

Ere  He  found  His  sheep  that  was  lost !  " 

Yet  however  long  the  search,  however  weary  the  way, 
He  will  not  slumber  nor  sleep  until  He  find  it ;  and  when 
He  hath  found  it.  He  layeth  it  on  His  own  shoulders 
rejoicing,  and  carries  it  home,  and  bids  His  friends  re- 
joice with  Him,  because  He  has  found  the  sheep  that  was 


lOO 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


lost !  And  Christ's  own  words  are  the  best  comment  on 
His  own  parable — "  I  am  the  Good  Shepherd,  and  I 
know  my  sheep,  and  am  known  of  mine ;  and  1  lay 
down  my  life  for  the  sheep.  And  other  sheep  I  have 
which  are  not  of  this  fold ;  them  also  I  must  bring 
and  they  shall  hear  my  voice,  and  they  shall  become 
one  flock,  one  shepherd."  The  early  Christians,  who 
were  happier  and  more  loving  than  we,  chose  this  image 
as  their  symbol  of  their  Lord.  It  was  their  instinct  to 
dwell  not  so  much  on  His  Death  as  on  His  Victory ; 
not  so  much  on  the  brief  anguish  as  on  the  triumphant 
love.  They  carved  Christ  upon  their  gems,  they  painted 
Him  in  their  catacombs,  they  gave  Him  the  central  place 
in  the  glittering  mosaics  of  their  basilicas — as  the  Good 
Shepherd  with  the  rescued  sheep  upon  his  shoulders. 
Their  one  thought  was,  "The  Lord  is  my  Shepherd,  I 
shall  not  want.  He  leadeth  me  in  the  green  pastures 
and  beside  the  still  waters.  He  restoreth  my  soul.  He 
leadeth  me  in  the  paths  of  righteousness  for  His  name's 
sake." 

7.  Let  us  never  forget  that  the  whole  drama  of  Ke- 
demption — the  Incarnation,  the  Ministry,  the  Cross, 
the  Eesurrection,  the  Ascension — what  was  it  all  but 
one  long  search  for  the  lost  sheep  and  carrying  it  home 
rejoicing  ?  The  whole  race  of  man  was  the  lost  sheep 
until  Christ  found  it.  All  we  like  sheep  have  gone 
astray.  We  had  gone  out  of  the  way,  we  had  altogether 
become  abominable,  and  the  Lord  laid  on  Him  the  in- 
iquity of  us  all.  Yea, 

"All  the  souls  that  are  were  forfeit  once. 
And  He  who  might  the  vantage  best  have  took 
Pound  out  the  remedy." 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


lOI 


Other  sheep  were  His — millions  of  spiritual  creatures 
thronging  the  Heaven  of  Heavens — Cherubim  and  Ser- 
aphim— the  lucent  spirits  of  knowledge  and  the  burning 
spirits  of  love,  and  an  innumerable  company  of  Angels 
in  all  their 

"Solemn  choirs  and  sweet  societies. 
Which  sing,  and  singing  in  their  glory  move." 

But  here  was  this  atom-world  floating  on  the  infinite 
bosom  of  the  bright  and  boundless  air,  "  a  speck  in  the 
faultless  glory,  a  discord  in  the  unimaginable  music,  a 
flutter  in  the  eternal  calm."  Yea  !  among  all  these 
stars  upon  stars  innumerable,  was  this  atom-world,  the 
ruined  habitation  of  a  fallen  race.  And  therefore  to 
this  poor  ruined  atom-world  He  came  down  all  those 
steps  of  the  infinite  descent.  Why  ?  because  God  is 
Love.  And  so  the  Father  sent  His  Son  into  the  world, 
that  all  who  believe  in  Him  should  not  perish,  but  have 
eternal  life  :  and  the  Son  emptied  Himself  of  His  Glory, 
taking  the  form  of  a  servant,  being  made  in  the  like- 
ness of  men  ;  and  as  the  Father  created,  and  the  Son 
redeemed  us,  so  the  Holy  Spirit  helpeth  our  infirmities 
and  maketh  intercession  for  us  with  groanings  which 
cannot  be  uttered.  Ah,  let  none  of  us  deceive  ourselves 
that  we  are  so  good,  so  correct,  so  righteous,  that  we  do 
not  need  the  Saviour.  We  all  need  Him,  from  the  least 
to  the  greatest,  the  religious  no  less  than  the  irreligious, 
the  Pharisee  no  less  than  the  Publican.  We  all  need 
Him,  and  He  loves  us  all.  Of  the  many  paltry  heresies 
which  have  attempted  to  crush  the  Gospel  under  a 
proud  and  self-satisfied  theology,  the  poorest  is  that 
which  pretended  that  Christ  died  only  for  the  elect. 


I02 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


He  died  for  all — for  all  were  dead.  He  gave  Himself  a 
ransom  for  all ;  for  all  had  been  taken  captive.  God 
delivered  Him  np  for  us  all,  because  we  all  had  sinned 
and  come  short  of  the  glory  of  God.  He  died  not  for 
the  elect  only,  but  for  sinners.  I  have  not  come  to  call 
the  righteous  only,  but  sinners  to  repentance.  This  is  a 
true  saying,  and  worthy  of  all  acceptation,  that  Christ 
Jesus  came  into  the  world  to  save  sinners.  Herein  is 
manifested  the  love  of  God  towards  us,  in  that,  while 
we  were  yet  sinners,  Christ  died  for  the  ungodly. 

8.  Such  then  is,  as  I  said,  the  one  central  lesson  of 
all  the  three  parables  of  this  chapter — the  Infinite 
yearning  of  Redemptive  Love.  Let  us  from  this  brief 
and  simple  survey  learn,  among  others,  three  brief  and 
simple  lessons. 

1.  The  first  is.  Let  us  all  be  pitiful.  How  utterly  un- 
Christlike  a  spirit  does  it  sliow,  nay,  how  deadly  a  sin  is 
it,  to  be  harsh,  severe,  unforgiving  to  sinners ;  to  despise 
and  hate,  instead  of  pitying  and  helping  them  !  Christ's 
spirit  of  love  is  utterly  alien  from  this  pitiless  abhorrence 
for  the  sinful  and  the  fallen.  As  for  sin,  indeed,  we 
cannot  hate  it  too  much  ;  it  is  the  adder  which  is  ever 
stinging  our  race  to  death,  and  we  ought,  every  one  of 
us,  to  do  all  we  can  to  crush  its  head.  But  for  the 
sinner — the  poor  bitten,  poisoned  victim,  if  we  be  like 
Christ  we  shall  feel  nothing  but  compassion.  A  poet 
has  written  a  legend  of  the  Lost  Pleiad,  and  it  is  this  : 
The  Pleiades — so  he  sings — were  seven  sisters,  and  it  was 
a  part  of  their  sweet  influence  to  listen  for  all  the  cries, 
and  watch  for  all  the  tears  of  God's  earthly  children, 
and  lift  them  to  heaven.  And  one  night  among  the 
myriad  cries  there  came  one  which  had  been  wrung  from 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


the  heart  of  a  stained,  sinful  woman,  "from  lips  that 
night's  nepenthe  could  not  calm."  It  was  a  long  wail 
for  mercy,  as,  meditating  suicide,  she  knelt,  with  the 
child  of  shame,  by  the  rim  of  a  black  river,  surging  out 
from  a  great  city's  glare  into  the  gloom.  And  Merope, 
the  brightest  of  the  Pleiades,  knowing  the  woman's  sin 
and  shame,  cried,  "The  prayer  shall  not  rise  to  God; 
the  woman's  punishment  is  just ; "  and  she  struck  the 
prayer  down  to  earth  again.  Then,  instantly,  the  voice 
of  God  rolled  living  thunder  among  the  Planets,  and 
bade  Merope  descend  from  her  star  to  earth — punished 
and  shamed  because  she  had  heard  unmoved  God's  low- 
est ask  His  love.  And  living  on  earth,  as  an  Indian 
maiden,  she  too  sinned  as  that  woman  had  sinned  whose 
prayer  she  had  struck  down  ;  and  as  she  too  knelt  medi- 
tating suicide,  by  the  rim  of  a  black  river,  surging  out 
from  a  great  city's  glare  into  the  gloom,  she  too  cried 
aloud  to  God,  and  her  prayer  was  struck  back  to  her  as 
she  had  spumed  the  prayer  of  the  sinful  woman ;  and 
when  the  waves  had  washed  out  her  foul  earthly  life,  she 
sat  thenceforth  dark  on  a  darkling  star,  because  she  had 
stood  between  God's  lowest  and  His  love. — Ah,  let  us  be 
pitiful !  "  Be  ye  kind  to  one  another,  tender-hearted, 
forgiving  one  another,  even  as  God  in  Christ  hath  for- 
given you." 

2.  And  the  second  lesson  is.  Let  none  despair.  There 
are  two  kinds  of  despair.  The  one  is  insolent  and 
defiant,  a  very  deadly  sin  against  the  Holy  Ghost. 
It  is  related  of  the  fierce  and  unhappy  Henry  II.  that, 
hurling  his  impotent  curse  at  God  because  he  had  lost 
the  town  of  Le  Mans,  he  exclaimed  :  "  Since  Thou  hast 
taken  from  me  the  town  that  I  loved  best  I  will  have 


I04 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


mj  revenge  on  Thee,  too.  I  will  rob  thee  of  that  thing 
Thou  loTest  most  in  me — my  souL"  Let  us  trust  that 
such  a  sin  against  the  Holy  Ghost  as  this  was  but  a  rare 
frenzy ;  but  not  rare  is  the  dull  misery  which  assumes 
that  it  can  have  no  hope,  that  it  has  sinned  too  deeply 
to  be  forgiven.  None  have  sinned  too  deeply  to  be  for- 
given. It  is  want  of  faith  thus  to  set  limits  to  the 
eflBcacy  of  Christ's  redemption.  Often,  indeed,  it  is 
too  late  to  avert  the  earthly  consequences  of  misdoing. 
They  may  last,  on  and  on,  through  many  a  bitter  year. 
The  boy's  idleness  shall  be  the  man's  poverty  and  shame. 
The  youth's  vice  shall  be  the  man's  agony  of  body  and 
stain  of  soul.  On  earth  the  sins  of  men  and  women  do 
find  them  out.  It  is  too  late  when  sin  has  been  com- 
mitted to  avert  its  penal  consequences.  When  we  have 
indulged  ourselves  in  any  wilful  sin  we  may  have  done 
with  it,  but  it  has  by  no  means  done  with  us.  But  it 
is  never  too  late  to  repent,  never  too  late  to  heal  sin's 
moral  ravage,  and  renew  its  spiritual  loss.  On  earth 
there  may  be  no  remission  of  punishment,  but,  thank 
God,  the  Son  of  Man  hath  power,  even  on  earth,  to  for- 
give sins. 

"  Canst  thou  not  minister  to  a  mind  diseased. 
And  ■with  some  sweet  oblivious  antidote 
Cleanse  the  stuffed  bosom  of  that  perilous  stufi 
Which  weighs  upon  the  heart  ?  " 

So  asks  the  murderer  in  the  great  tragedy ;  and  again— 

"  Wai  all  great  Neptune's  ocean  wash  this  blood 
Clean  from  my  hand  ?   No,  this  my  hand  will  rather 
The  multitudinous  seas  incarnadine. 
Making  the  green — one  red." 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


But  whatever  sin  yoa  have  committed — however  deep, 
however  dark,  however  damning,  though  there  be  no 
physic  for  your  misery,  no  oceans  to  wash  out  your 
stain,  if  you  will  but  repent  of  it,  if  you  will  but  come 
to  Christ  with  the  burden  of  it,  all  weary  and  heavy- 
laden  as  you  are,  there  is  heavenly  medicine,  there  is 
lustral  water  at  the  wicket-gate.  Yes !  believe  it ! 
There  is  a  balm  in  Gilead  which  can  heal  your  sick 
conscience,  and  a  good  Physician  there.  On  this  side 
the  grave  there  may  be  for  you  no  fields  of  amaranth 
or  asphodel,  but  there  are  beyond  the  grave,  and 
through  them  rolls  a  river  of  sweet  forgetfulness,  one 
drop  of  which  can  soothe  the  haunted  memory.  There 
is — oh,  there  is — a  Pool  of  Siloam  where  you  can  receive 
your  sight ;  a  Bethesda-wave  for  the  impotent ;  waters 
of  Jordan  wherein  you  can  wash  and  be  clean. 

"  There  is  a  fountain  filled  with  blood, 

Drawn  from  Emmanuel's  veins. 
And  sinners  plunged  beneath  that  flood 

Lose  all  their  guilty  stains. 
The  dying  thief  rejoiced  to  see 

That  fountain  in  his  day  ; 
And  there  may  I,  as  vile  as  he, 

Wash  all  my  sins  away." 

You  err  if  you  think  we  can  only  go  to  Christ  when  we 
are  good  and  pure.  Nay,  we  may  go  to  Him  guilty  and 
helpless,  and  He  will  purify  and  heal.  Peace,  peace  to 
him  that  is  afar  ofif,  as  well  as  to  him  that  is  near. 
Even  over  the  waters  of  the  deluge  that  drowns  our 
souls  flies  the  dove,  and  lo  !  in  her  mouth  an  olive  leaf 
plucked  off.  It  is  Christ's  office  to  save,  and  ours  to  look 
to  Him  for  help.    "  If  evil  tempers  arise,"  said  the  ex- 


io6 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


cellent  Berridge,  "  I  go  to  Him  as  some  demoniac.  If 
deadness  creeps  upon  me,  I  go  as  a  paralytic.  If  dark- 
ness clouds  my  face,  I  go  as  a  Bartimseus.  And  wlien  I 
pray  I  always  go  as  a  leper,  crying,  as  Isaiah,  did,  '  Un- 
clean, unclean  ! ' " 

3.  And  the  third  lesson,  which  we  may  surely  learn,  is 
to  think  noble  thoughts  of  God — even  the  thoughts 
which  again,  and  again,  and  again  He  has  taught  us 
respecting  Himself.  Of  what  happens  beyond  the 
grave  we  know  but  little.  We  know  only  that  while 
any  man  continues  in  sin  unrepented  of  he  cannot  see 
God  ;  we  know  only  that  whatever  else  hell  may  be 
it  is,  beyond  all  doubt,  a  temper  and  a  condition,  and 
that  where  sin  is,  there  is  and  must  be  hell.  We  know 
only  that  until  sin  be  forsaken,  so  long  it  must  and  will 
bring  its  own  curse  and  punishment,  being  itself  its  own 
vilest  curse  and  its  own  most  terrific  punishment.  The 
bad  man,  so  long  as  it  is  his  choice  to  remain  a  bad  man, 
must  say  with  Milton's  Satan  : 

"  What  matter  where,  if  /be  still  the  same." 

But  when  men  draw  the  abhorrent  pictures,  which  they 
often  have  drawn,  of  the  torments  of  the  lost,  I  think  of 
the  legend  of  the  martyr  Carpus — how,  passing  to  glory 
on  the  fiery  chariot  of  his  martyrdom,  he  looked  dawn 
and  saw  the  tormented  souls  of  the  heathen  and  cruel 
persecutors,  and  raised  his  hand  to  curse  them,  when  a^ 
voice,  sweet  and  terrible,  thrilled  through  his  soul  the 
question  :  "  Carpus,  dost  thou  curse  these  ?  I  died  to 
save  them."  Eead  these  parables  in  the  light  of  the 
relentless  Pharisaism  which,  supporting  its  own  ruth- 
lessness  by  scraps  of  texts  and  shreds  of  metaphor,  used 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


107 


to  call  itself  orthodox  theology,  until  men  were  almost 
tempted  to  exclaim  with  the  American  poet  that  "a 
natural  man  is  better  than  an  unnatural  theologian." 
Have  you  read  the  poet's  vision  ? 

"  There  came  a  soul  tx)  the  gate  of  Heaven, 
Gliding  slow  ; 
A  soul  that  was  ransomed  and  forgiven. 

And  white  as  snow — 
And  the  angels  all  were  silent. 

"  '  Now  open  the  gate  and  let  her  in. 

And  fling  it  wide, 
For  she  hath  been  cleansed  from  stain  of  sin,' 

St,  Peter  cried — 
And  the  angels  all  were  silent. 

"  '  I  come,'  she  said,  '  to  the  pearly  door 

To  see  the  throne. 
Where  sits  the  Lamb  on  the  sapphire  floor, 

With  God  alone. 
I  come  to  hear  the  new  song  they  sing 

To  Him  that  died, 
And  note  where  the  healing  waters  spring, 

From  His  pierced  side. 

"  '  But  I  may  not  enter  there,'  she  said, 
'  For  I  mtist  go 
Across  the  gulf  where  the  guilty  dead 

Lie  in  their  woe' — 
And  the  angels  all  were  silent. 

'  I  come  where  there  is  no  night,'  she  said, 

'  To  go  away, 
And  help,  if  I  yet  may  help,  the  dead 

That  have  no  day ' — 
And  the  angels  all  were  sUent. 


io8 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


"  St.  Peter,  he  turned  the  keys  about. 
And  answered  grim  : 
'  Can  you  love  the  Lord  and  abide  without. 

Afar  from  from  Him  ? ' 
And  the  angels  all  were  silent. 

"  •  Should  I  be  nearer  Christ,'  she  said, 

'  By  pitying  less 
The  sinful  living  and  woful  dead 

In  their  helplessness  ? 
Shoidd  I  be  liker  Christ,  were  I 

To  love  no  more 
The  loved,  who  in  their  anguish  lie 

Outside  the  door  ? ' 
And  the  angels  all  were  silent. 

*'  The  Lord  himself  stood  by  the  gate 

And  heard  her  speak 
Those  tender  words  compassionate, 

Gentle  and  meek  : — 
Now  pity  is  the  touch  of  God 

In  human  hearts  ; 
And  from  that  way  He  ever  trod 

He  ne'er  departs — 
And  the  angels  all  were  silent. 

And  He  said,  '  Now  wiU  I  go  with  you. 

Dear  chUd  of  Love, 
And  I  will  leave  this  glory,  too, 

In  Heaven  above.' 

"  And  He  said,  '  We  will  seek  and  save  the  lost, 
If  they  will  hear — 
They  who  are  worst,  but  need  me  most. 

And  all  are  dear ' — 
And  the  angels  all  were  sUent," 

The  angels  all  were  silent !  Nay,  I  think  the  poet  is 
wrong  there  !   When  there  shall  be  no  more  sorrow 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


and  no  more  sighing ;  when  God  shall  have  wiped  all 
tears  from  off  all  faces,  in  the  restitution  of  all  things  ; 
when  God  shall  be  all  in  all  ;  when  the  lost  sheep  is 
brought  home,  the  lost  coin  found,  the  lost  son  wel- 
comed repentant  to  his  Father's  home ;  when  the 
whole  meal  is  leavened ;  when  the  Son  of  Man,  having 
been  lifted  up,  has  drawn  all  men  unto  Him  ;  when  He 
has  destroyed  the  works  of  the  devil ;  when  He  has  had 
mercy  upon  all ;  when  He  has  become  Lord  of  the  dead 
and  of  the  living ;  when  He  hath  gathered  together 
into  one  all  things  in  Christ ;  when  He  has  reconciled 
all  men  to  Himself — and  remember  that  every  one  of 
these  sentences  (whatever  else  there  may  be  in  Scripture 
which  looks  the  other  way)  is  a  Scripture  text  and  a 
Scripture  promise — then,  if  there  be  joy  in  heaven 
over  one  sinner  that  repenteth,  more  than  over  ninety 
and  nine  just  persons  who  need  no  repentance,  what 
shall  there  be  over  myriads  and  the  multitude  which  no 
man  can  number  ?  What  shall  there  be — if  such  a  day 
ever  come — in  the  day  of  the  universal  redemption  of 
mankind  ? 

"  And  all  through  the  mountains,  thunder-riven. 

And  up  from  the  rocky  steep, 
There  rose  a  cry  to  the  gate  of  heaven, 

'  Rejoice  !  I  have  found  my  sheep  ! ' 
And  the  angels  echoed  around  the  throne: 

'  Eejoice  !  for  the  Lord  brings  back  His  own.' " 

The  angels  all  stood  silent  ?  Nay,  the  poet  is  wrong 
there  !  but  rather,  when  the  Good  Shepherd  calls  heaven 
and  earth  together  to  witness  His  final  and  eternal 
triumph,  such  a  tumult  of  acclaim  shall  ring  through 
heaven,  such  a  seven-fold  chorus  of  harping  symphonies. 


I  lO 


The  Lost  Sheep. 


"  While  all  the  roimdes  and  arches  blue 
Resound  and  echo  Hallelu — " 

Such  a  whirlwind  of  multitudinous  joy  shall  sweep  the 
perfect  diapason  of  those  innumerable  harps, 

"  With  saintly  shout  and  solemn  jubilee. 
Where  the  bright  Seraphim  in  burning  row 
Their  loud,  uplifted,  angel-trumpets  blow, 
And  the  Cherubic  Host  in  thousand  choirs 
Sound  their  immortal  harps  of  golden  wires, 
With  those  just  Spirits  that  wear  victorious  palms 
Hymns  devout  and  holy  psalms 
Singing  everlastingly  " — 

Yea  !  There  shall  be  such  a  song  like  the  sound  of 
thunder,  and  the  voice  of  many  waters,  that  the  uni- 
verse of  God  shall  never  have  heard  such  floods  of  unim- 
aginable music — no !  not  when  herald  angels  sang  the 
birth  of  the  Saviour ;  no  not  when  at  creation's  dawn  ! 
the  morning  stars  sang  together,  and  all  the  sons  of 
God  shouted  for  joy. 


SERMON  VIII. 


Preached  in  St.  Peter's,  Baltimore,  on  Sunday  Evening, 
Oct.  3,  1885. 


"  Either  what  woman,  having  ten  pieces  of  silver,  if  she  lose 
one  piece,  doth  not  light  a  candle,  and  sweep  the  house,  and  seek 
diligently  tiU  she  find  it?" — Luke  xv.  8. 

I  CHOOSE  this  subject,  my  friends,  because  it  is  sug- 
gested by  the  second  lesson  of  this  morning's  service, 
and  because  it  enables  me  to  continue  the  line  of 
thought  on  which  I  dwelt  this  morning  in  another 
church.  Doubtless  a  passing  curiosity  to  hear  a  stran- 
ger from  your  kin  beyond  the  sea  has  brought  many  of 
you  here  to-night.  My  friends,  you  will  hear  no  ora- 
tory ;  nothing  to  please  or  tickle  the  itching  ear ;  noth- 
ing unusual  to  startle  you.  You  will  hear,  I  trust,  a 
simple  statement  of  some  truths  which  are  not  without 
their  own  momentous  import  to  your  souls  ;  but  whether 
those  truths  bear  any  fruit,  or  are  carried  away  by  idle 
remarks  which,  like  birds  of  the  air,  remain  in  flocks  at 
every  church  door,  that  depends  on  you — on  your  own 
seriousness  and  nobleness  of  spirit — on  your  own  meek 


I  12 


The  Lost  Coin. 


heart  and  due  reverence  fox  the  eternal  realities,  and  on 
Him  to  whom  we  pray  for  aid,  and  who  can  send  forth 
His  spirit,  even  as  the  wind  bloweth  where  it  listeth,  and 
thou  hearest  the  sound  thereof  but  canst  not  tell  whither 
it  goeth. 

1.  The  word  for  the  "  piece  of  silver  "  in  the  original 
\s  drachma  ;  in  Wyclif 's  version  it  is  rendered  bezant; 
in  Tyndale's,  groat.  It  merely  represents  the  current 
Greek  silver  coin  of  the  day ;  and  therefore,  to  many, 
the  position  of  the  parable,  between  that  of  the  Lost 
Sheep  and  the  Lost  Son,  seems  something  of  an  anti- 
climax. The  lost  sheep  is  a  living  thing,  and  might  be 
regarded  with  affection  ;  the  lost  son  is  unspeakably 
dear  to  the  father's  heart ;  but  it  might  seem  that  the 
lost  coin,  being  at  the  best  but  a  dead  thing,  is  less  in- 
teresting and  less  estimable.  Now,  my  friends,  when- 
ever there  seems  to  us  to  be  a  defect  of  this  kind  in  the 
order  of  the  Lord's  teaching,  we  may  be  sure  beforehand 
that  the  defect  is  either  in  the  narrator,  or  more  proba- 
bly in  our  apprehension  ;  and  I  think  that  if  we  look  a 
little  closer  at  this  short,  intervening  parable,  we  shall 
see  that  it  contains  some  original,  independent,  and 
deeply  instructive  truths. 

2.  The  progress  in  the  three  parables  has  sometimes 
been  supposed  to  lie  in  the  fact  that  the  lost  coin  is  one 
of  only  ten,  and  the  lost  son  is  one  of  only  two,  whereas 
the  lost  sheep  is  one  of  a  hundred,  and  therefore  less 
valuable  or  less  likely  to  be  painfully  missed.  The  true 
explanation,  I  think,  is  different.  It  lies  partly  in  new 
conceptions  about  the  state  of  sin  and  new  conceptions 
about  the  love  of  God  ;  and  if  we  can  make  these  quite 
clear,  we  may  henceforth  read  the  parable  of  the  Lost 


The  Lost  Coin. 


"3 


Coin  with  no  less  interest  than  the  other  two  by  which 
it  is  accompanied. 

3.  Why  is  the  woman  in  the  parable  so  exceedingly 
anxious  to  recover  her  lost  coin  ?  Why  is  she  so  rejoiced 
at  finding  it  that,  in  a  manner  which  surprises  us,  she 
thinks  it  a  fit  occasion  to  call  together  her  friends  and 
neighbors  that  they  may  share  her  joy  ? 

I  think  for  this  reason,  which  is  not  present  to  our 
minds,  but  would  be  so  at  once  to  Christ's  hearers : 
Women  in  the  East  do  not  often  carry  money  about  with 
them,  and  even  if  they  did,  there  might  seem  to  be 
something  unworthy  in  such  demonstrative  gladness 
over  a  found  piece  of  money.  But,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  commonest  and  most  cherished  ornament  of  women 
of  all  classes  is  a  fringe  of  gold  or  silver  coins  worn  on 
the  summit  of  the  forehead,  and  very  frequently  ten  in 
number.  All  travellers  in  the  East,  and  especially  at  Naz- 
areth, notice  the  frequency  of  this  ornament,  which  is 
called  the  semedi,  and  which,  like  all  the  other  articles 
of  dress  and  ornament  in  the  changeless  East,  is  proba- 
bly of  extreme  antiquity.  Our  Lord  had  doubtless  seen 
it — perhaps  on  the  forehead  of  the  Virgin  of  Naza- 
reth, perhaps  on  the  forehead  of  the  bride  of  Cana,  or 
the  sisters  of  Bethany.  It  is  often  the  most  valuable  and 
the  most  beautiful  of  all  the  young  bride's  jewels  ;  and 
it  is  additionally  precious  because,  like  the  silver  orna- 
ments of  the  Swiss  maidens,  it  is  frequently  an  heir- 
loom, handed  down  for  generations  from  mother  to 
daughter.  Now,  imagine  that  some  young  bride,  rejoic- 
ing in  the  jewel  with  which  on  special  occasions  she 
adorns  herself  for  her  husband,  had,  through  careless- 
ness or  negligence,  suffered  one  of  the  coins  to  drop  from 


114 


The  Lost  Coin. 


the  circlet.  Can  we  not  see  that  the  beauty  and  symme- 
try of  the  whole  ornament  would  be  spoilt  ?  The  other 
nine  coins  would  lose  their  chief  value ;  and  there 
would  be  such  dissightliness  in  the  gap  where  the  lost 
coin  had  been,  that  the  semedi  could  be  worn  no  longer 
until  the  coin  is  found,  and  the  neglect  repaired. 

Now,  when  we  bear  this  in  mind,  does  not  the  little 
parable  show  us  a  new  advance  in  the  thought,  a  new 
flash  of  insight  into  the  will  of  God  ?  The  motive  of 
the  Good  Shepherd  in  searching  for  the  lost  sheep  is  love 
and  pity.  He  is  a  type  of  God's  divine  compassion  for 
human  misery  and  sin.  The  woman's  solicitude  for  the 
lost  silverling  presents  us  with  an  entirely  new  image. 
The  coin  is  indeed  a  dead  thing.  It  needs  no  pity. 
Being  inanimate  it  can  feel  no  loss.  It  does  not  repre- 
sent the  sinner  in  his  aspect  of  suffering,  for  it  is  uncon- 
scious, but  the  sinner  in  his  aspect  of  degradation  which 
he  cannot  himself  realize ;  the  sinner  in  his  dull  indif- 
ference and  deathf  ul  stupidity.  The  parable  turns  us 
more  entirely  to  the  care  of  God,  who  loves  lost  souls  not 
only  for  their  sakes — since  small  indeed  is  their  intrin- 
sic worth — but  for  His  own.  And  here  at  once  is  a  mar- 
vellous lesson.  Sometimes,  when  we  read  in  history  of 
a  black  character,  a  stubborn  character — childish,  ani- 
mal, counterfeit,  scurrilous  ;  sometimes,  when  we  see  in 
daily  life  the  pettiness  and  frivolity  of  some  souls  ;  the 
sluggishness,  the  vanity,  the  malignity,  the  selfishness 
of  others  ;  sometimes,  when  it  is  borne  in  upon  us  that 
we  men  are  indeed  a  little  breed,  that  most  of  us, 
even  if  not  wholly  bad,  are  yet  desperately  imperfect, 
we  are  tempted,  or  half  tempted,  by  our  pride  and 
faithlessness,  to  think  how  small  a  loss  it  would  be 


The  Lost  Coin. 


115 


if  another  and  final  deluge  of  fire  consumed  forever 
"  these  feeble  vassals  of  lust  and  anger  and  wine — 
these  little  hearts  who  know  not  how  to  forgive."  You 
see  some  blighted  wretch,  a  curse  to  himself,  a  curse  to 
his  family,  a  curse  to  the  parish  in  which  he  lives,  a 
curse  to  the  nation  whose  name  he  disgraces,  degraded 
from  what  was  once  a  man  into  sometimes  a  beast,  and 
sometimes  a  fiend  : — and  in  our  least  Christlike  moments 
we  might  be  tempted  to  say,  unpityingly.  It  would  be 
small  loss  to  the  universe  of  God  if  such  men  or  such 
women — or  what  once  were  men  and  women — were 
simply  to  cease  to  be ;  to  forfeit  forever,  at  death,  the 
life  which  they  have  so  unspeakably  degraded.  We 
see  a  child  going  astray,  and  speaking  lies  almost  from 
his  cradle  ;  we  see  an  indolent,  selfish  youth,  content 
to  be  dependent  on  the  toil  of  others  not  his  own,  sitting 
down,  a  useless  and  unwelcome  guest,  at  the  feast  of  life, 
and  never  meaning  to  do  his  appointed  task  ;  you  see  sav- 
age races,  unspeakably  vicious  and  hopelessly  squalid  ; 
you  read  the  vain  and  vile  literature  of  masses  of  men — 
in  the  upper  classes  so  empty  and  godless,  in  the  lower 
classes  so  violent  and  obscene  ;  you  watch  the  aims  of 
persons  who  pass  for  respectable,  their  pushing  selfish- 
ness, their  reckless  greed,  their  paltry  hopes  and  mean 
desires  ;  and  again,  in  our  least  faithful  and  hopeful 
moments,  we  are  half  tempted  to  doubt  whether  the 
indignity  of  death  is  not  a  sufiicient  ending  for  tliose 
who  have  nothing  to  offer  to  the  God  who  made  them 
except  dust  and  ashes  and  moral  degradation.  Well, 
now  we  may  see  the  reason  for  the  detail  which  might 
otherwise  have  seemed  surprising — the  fact  that  the 
lost  coin  is  intrinsically  of  such  small  value  ;  a  coin 


ii6 


The  Lost  Coin, 


not  of  gold,  but  of  silver ;  only  a  drachma,  a  shilling. 
Why  should  the  woman  or  any  one  else  much  care,  if 
it  lay  forever  in  some  vile  corner  in  the  dust  and  dark- 
ness ?  Ah  !  but  God  does  not  think  so  !  His  desire  is 
that  nothing 

"  Should  walk  with  aimless  feet; 

That  not  one  life  should  be  destroyed, 
Or  cast  as  rubbish  in  the  void, 
When  He  has  made  the  pile  complete." 

The  value  of  the  lost  coin  is  not  its  intrinsic  value ; 
not  even  the  poor  value  of  which  it  is  itself  uncon- 
scious ;  but  the  value  which  it  has  in  His  eyes  who 
moulded  it  of  metal  inherently  precious,  and  stamped 
it  bright  from  the  mint  of  eternity.  All  but  worth- 
less in  itself,  it  yet  once  formed  part  of  a  beloved 
and  precious  ornament ;  it  yet  bears  the  image  and 
superscription  of  a  king.  Its  value  is  simply  infinite, 
for  it  is  the  value  which  God  sets  upon  it.  The  lost 
coin  of  this  wretched  and  paltry  race  of  man — all  !  call 
it  not  wretched  and  paltry,  even  when  it  lies  useless 
and  darkling  in  the  mire,  for  it  belongs  to  God  ;  and  if 
no  one  else  cares  for  it,  God  cares.  The  lost  coin  of  the 
soul  of  the  drunkard,  and  the  gambler,  and  the  unclean, 
to  man's  eye  so  deplorable  or  so  contemptible,  it  is  right 
precious  in  the  sight  of  Him,  our  Father,  without 
whom  not  a  sparrow  falleth  to  the  ground.  The  lost 
coin — it  may  be  of  your  soul  or  mine — how  little  man 
pities  it  !  How  little  man  cares  for  it !  Ah  !  but  God 
— the  great  God  Himself  in  His  Son  Jesus  Christ,  is 
searching  diligently  until  he  finds  it !  What  is  it  that 
keeps  so  many  souls  fast  bound  in  misery  and  iron  ?  Is 


The  Lost  Coin. 


117 


it  not  on  fhe  one  hand  the  utter  loss  of  self-respect, 
on  the  other  hand  the  stupefaction  of  despair  ?  Oh  ! 
miserable  and  perishing  sinner !  Oh  !  slave  of  vice  ! 
Oh  !  dead  to  shame  !  Oh  ! — lowest  of  all — lost  woman, 
doomed  to  know 

"  Nights  of  pollution,  days  of  blasphemy, 
Who,  in  loathed  orgies  with  lewd  wassailers. 
Must  gaily  laugh,  while  thy  remembered  home 
Gnaws  like  a  viper  at  thy  secret  heart " — 

if  God  still  cares  for  you,  will  you  care  nothing  for 
yourself  ?  If  in  yourself  you  despair,  is  it  nothing  that 
God  has  not  abandoned,  will  not  abandon.  His  hope 
for  you  ?  even  for  you  ?  even  for  you  ? 

3.  In  truth  there  lies  in  this  parable,  and  in  the  rev- 
elation it  contains  of  God's  care  for  man,  the  sole  aspect 
of  human  life  which  can  support  and  inspire  the  sinking 
soul ;  the  sinking  souls,  whether  of  the  lost  and  fallen 
themselves,  or  of  those  who,  saved  themselves,  yet  share 
for  the  souls  of  their  brethren  the  yearning  compassion 
of  Christ  their  Lord.  Eecall  the  occasion  of  these  three 
parables.  It  was  the  murmuring  of  the  Pharisees,  be- 
cause Christ  had  received  sinners  and  eaten  with  them. 
See  what  a  lesson  is  here  taught  to  the  indifference 
alike  of  the  world,  which  despises  the  wretched,  and 
of  those  religionists  who,  without  a  shudder,  regard 
them  as  little  better  than  fuel  for  the  everlasting  flame. 
The  world  !  what  does  the  world  in  general  care  for 
the  outcasts  ?  It  chatters  its  gossip,  and  squanders  its 
money  on  itself,  or  hoards  it  for  itself,  and  sips  its  wine, 
and  makes  its  fortune,  and  would  not  let  its  little  finger 
ache  for  the  present  misery,  much  less  for  the  eternal 


1 1 8  The  Lost  Coin. 

ruin  of  such  as  these.  The  cynic  shrugs  his  shoulders, 
and  says :  "  How  can  I  help  it  ?  "  and  asks  :  "  Am  I 
my  brother's  keeper  ?  "  The  selfish  man  takes  refuge  in 
his  individual  comforts,  and  ignores  everything  else. 
The  faint-hearted  say  it  is  quite  useless  to  struggle 
against  all  this  vice  and  sufEering.  The  sluggishly  pit- 
iful sentimentalize  about  it  in  their  delicious  solitude. 
The  unbeliever  flings  away  the  whole  subject  with  a 
curse.  He  says,  with  a  poet  of  yesterday,  half  ironical, 
half  desparing,  full  of  haughty  and  fastidious  contempt : 

"  In  dirt  and  sin  ye  all  were  born, 

In  sin  and  dirt  ye  all  were  bred  ; 
WaUow  untQ  your  lives  be  through, 
Satan's  godchildren  take  your  due  I 
The  devil  whom  your  fathers  served 

Will  bate  no  tittle  of  his  wage  ; 
Deformed,  enfeebled,  and  unnerved, 

Ye  totter  to  your  early  age. 

"  Around  your  life  a  wall  is  built, 
In  pain  and  toil  ye  plod  apart ; 
The  livery  of  your  soul  is  guilt, 

And  grief  the  girdle  of  your  heart ; 
For  he  who  held  you  at  the  first 
Has  cursed  you,  and  ye  shall  be  cujst." 

And  then  he  adds  :  "  Since  you  will  take  nothing 
better  that  we  offer  you,  take  the  money,  which  is  the 
only  thing  you  ask,  and  the  only  thing  we  can  give. 

"  Take  it;  disperse  the  rich  man's  store ; 

Take  it,  and  satisfy  your  need  ; 
Then  misbeget  some  millions  more 

For  our  posterity  to  feed. 
We  cannot  measure  worlds  by  rule. 
Nor  put  a  continent  to  school ." 


The  Lost  Coin. 


119 


Such  is  the  despairing  ban  which  this  poet  hurls  upon 
the  wretched  and  the  sinful ;  such  the  cold  sponge  of 
vinegar  which  he  pushes  on  a  hyssop-stalk  to  their 
parched  lips  ;  such  the  charity  with  which  he  tosses  to 
them  his  scornful  alms.  How  utterly  alien  it  is  from 
the  mind  of  Christ !  Yet  hardly  so  alien,  I  think,  as 
that  callous  theology  which,  hugging  its  own  plank 
of  supposed  safety  amid  the  weltering  of  the  fiery 
deluge,  looks  with  perfect  equanimity  on  the  ruin  of  a 
world,  so  its  own  selfish  heaven  is  secure  ;  and  which 
has  sometimes  told  us,  with  all  the  imperiousness  of 
orthodox  authority,  that  the  anguish  of  the  lost  will  be 
a  blissful  spectacle  for  the  increased  delectation  of  the 
elected  few.  Such  is  the  sympathy  of  man,  religious 
and  irreligious,  for  his  fellow-man  ! 

Thank  God,  God  is  not  like  men  ;  and  had  it  not 
been  for  that  immeasurable  love  which  even  sin  could 
not  change  into  abhorrence,  there  would  long  ago  have 
been  no  hope,  and  we  could  only  have  trusted  that  this 
life  of  rebellion  and  misery  would  be  enough,  and  man 
become — the  sooner  the  better — a  dim  tradition  linger- 
ing amid  the  inhabitants  of  some  happier  universe 
which  yet  may  be. 

4.  I  say  that  nothing  save  Christ's  revelation  of  God's 
love  for  wretched  human  souls  can  save  us  from  despair. 
For  when  we  remember  that  men  liave  bodies  and  are 
spirits,  how  awful  to  a  child  of  God  does  the  aspect  of 
the  world  appear  in  its  wreck  and  ruin  of  human  souls  ! 
The  Greek  poet  describes  a  ravenous  lion,  leaping  upon 
a  flock  of  defenceless  sheep,  and  bathing  his  bloody  jaws 
in  rivers  of  massacre.  Alas !  how  long  ago  has  there 
leapt  upon  the  flock  of  God  a  roaring  lion,  seeking 


I20 


The  Lost  Coin. 


whom  he  may  devour  !  And  what  herds  of  raging 
wolves  leap  in  upon  his  track  !  the  passions  in  their  fury 
— ambition,  avarice,  lust — how  do  these  rend  the  help- 
less flock  !  And  how  do  bad  men  themselves — bad  men, 
who  are  man's  worst  enemies— do  abundantly  the  devil's 
work  !  And  as  there  is  hope  to  us  when  we  think  that 
the  Good  Shepherd  will  yet  deliver  His  flock,  is  there 
no  terror  to  tliose  who  help  to  rend  it  ?  The  young 
man  thinks  nothing  of  it,  it  may  be,  when  with  brutal, 
unmanly  selfishness,  tempting  the  weak  to  their  destruc- 
tion, he  sacrifices,  or  helps  to  sacrifice,  for  his  own  vilest 
impulse,  a  soul  which  but  for  his  execrable  baseness 
might  have  been  innocent  and  fair.  But  does  he  think 
that  God  does  not  see,  that  the  Almighty  does  not  regard 
it  ?  Ah  !  God  has  his  eye  on  that  torn  sheep,  on  that 
lost  lamb.  Men  live  upon,  make  their  fortunes  by,  the 
ruin,  the  temptation,  and  debasement  of  the  helpless ; 
do  they  ever  think  that  what  is  flowing  into  their  coffers 
is  not  gold,  but  a  rill  from  the  crimson  ooze  of  that  in- 
fernal river  which  is  formed  of  tears  and  blood  ?  Ah  ! 
but  God  sees  it,  and  things  are  what  they  are,  in  spite  of 
all  sophisms ;  aye,  and  their  consequences  will  be  what 
they  will  be  in  spite  of  all  excuse.  Man  looks  on,  callous, 
apathetic,  indifferent  to  the  loss  of  souls.  And  the  worst 
men  ruthlessly  and  indifferently  destroy  the  souls  of 
their  brother-men,  and  leave  their  own  souls  contentedly 
lying  in  the  mire  of  this  world's  sin  and  shame.  But 
the  only  ray  of  comfort,  whether  in  the  present  or  in  the 
future,  lies  in  the  thought  that  God  cares.  The  coin 
lies  there — lost,  unconscious,  a  dead  thing,  always  of  lit- 
tle value,,  and  now  entirely  useless,  in  the  dust.  Aye, 
but  God  still  values  it !   If  He  sees  its  present  deteri- 


The  Lost  Coin. 


121 


oration.  He  knows  also  its  original  brilliancy,  and 
its  future  preciousness  when  it  shall  be  found  once 
more. 

5.  So  far  then  we  have  seen  that  the  value  of  every 
soul,  the  value  even  of  lost  souls,  lies  in  the  fact  which 
we  should  never  have  known,  have  never  dared  to  sur- 
mise if  the  Son  of  God  had  not  revealed  it  to  us,  that 
they  are  right  dear  in  the  sight  of  God.  And  the  parable 
shows  us  further  that  they  are  dear  not  only  for  their 
own  sakes,  to  the  God  who  made  and  the  Saviour 
who  redeemed,  and  the  Holy  Spirit  who  intercedes  for 
them,  but  dear  also  because  they  forni  part  of  that  great 
universe  of  God,  which  now  groaneth  and  travaileth  in 
pain,  but  which  waits  for  the  adoption,  that  is,  the  re- 
demption of  the  body.  Just  as  the  dropped  coin  ruins 
the  symmetry  and  spoils  the  beauty  of  the  bride's  orna- 
ment, so  the  lost  souls  mar  the  divine  perfection  of  God's 
ornament,  of  that  Kosmos  which  means  both  ornament 
and  universe.  It  is  with  God's  love  as  with  ours.  We 
condole  with  the  father  whose  unworthy  son  is  bringing 
his  gray  hairs  with  sorrow  to  the  grave,  and  we  point 
him  to  his  other  sons,  who  are  living  pure  and  upright 
and  honorable  lives.  But  ah  no  !  it  avails  not ;  and  he 
will  only  turn  aside  to  hide  the  noble  tears  which  he 
sheds  for  his  lost  boy.  The  sons  and  daughters  grow  up 
around  their  mother,  and  you  think  that  she  is  content 
and  happy,  and  that  she  has  long  forgotten  that  little 
grave  in  the  churchyard,  where  the  grass  is  green  over 
the  child  she  lost  in  other  years.  Yes,  so  it  seems  to 
the  world's  indifferent  eyes  ;  but  watch  her  in  her  soli- 
tude, when,  on  her  knees,  before  her  God,  she  sheds  pas- 
sionate tears  over  the  little  curl  of  flaxen  hair  which  she 


122 


The  Lost  Coin. 


cnt  from  the  white  forehead  of  the  sweet  dead  face.  It 
is  not  so  easy  even  for  true  human  love  to  fill  up  its 
aching  void  ;  and  the  Lord  teaches  us  here  that  it  is 
still  more  impossible  for  the  love  divine,  which  excels 
all  love.  There  are  ninety  sheep  and  nine  in  the  safe 
fold  ;  there  are  nine  coins  unlost ;  one  son  is  working 
steadily  at  home — ah  !  but  the  one  lost  sheep,  the  one 
lost  coin,  the  one  poor  prodigal  in  the  far  land  still 
troubles  the  great  heart  of  God  !  Without  it  His  flock 
is  incomplete  ;  His  jewel  is  ruined  ;  His  home  is  desolate. 
So  Christ  teaches  us.  And  does  it  not  cause  us  to  recall 
the  song  of  your  poet : 

"  Thou  lovest  all  I  Thy  erring  child  may  be 
Lost  to  himself,  but  never  lost  to  Thee. 

"  All  souls  are  Thine  ;  the  wings  of  morning  bear 
None  from  that  presence  which  is  everywhere. 
Nor  hell  itself  can  hide,  for  Thou  art  there. 

"  Through  sins  of  sense,  perversities  of  will, 
Through  doubt  and  pain,  through  gilt,  and  shame,  and  ill. 
Thy  pitying  eye  is  on  Thy  creature  stiU. 

"  Wilt  thou  not  make.  Eternal  Source  and  goal, 
In  Thy  long  years  life's  broken  circle  whole. 
And  change  to  joy  the  cry  of  a  lost  soul  ?  " 

6.  I  think  that  these  aspects  of  the  truth  deserve  our 
deepest  contemplation.  But  Christ's  parables  are  in- 
exhaustible in  richness,  and  I  must  glance  for  a  mo- 
ment at  still  other  lessons.  The  woman  who,  having 
lost  the  coin,  lights  the  candle  and  sweeps  the  house, 
and  looks  diligently  till  she  finds  it — who  is  she  ?  She 
is  perhaps  meant  for  the  Church  of  God.    The  Sheep 


The  Lost  Coin. 


123 


wanders  out  of  the  fold  ;  the  Son  goes  into  a  far  coun- 
try ;  but  the  Coin  is  lost  in  the  house  itself.  All  that 
the  woman  can  do  is  to  repair,  to  her  utmost,  the  conse- 
quences of  her  own  neglect.  It  requires  effort  and 
trouble  ;  the  furniture  must  be  moved  ;  the  candle 
must  be  held,  high  and  low,  in  every  corner  ;  the  dust 
must  fly  about  :  but  unless  she  neglect  her  duty  alto- 
gether she  must  go  on  searching  diligently  till  she  find 
the  coin.  If  she  leaves  it  lying  neglected  till  the  tarnish 
spoils  it,  and  the  dirt  settles  thickly  over  it,  she  has 
ruined  her  loveliest  adornment,  and  the  unlost  coins 
which  form  it  become  useless  too.  Oh,  what  a  lesson 
for  the  Church  of  God  !  There  in  England,  what  are 
whole  masses  of  our  godless  population,  high  and  low — 
the  drunkard,  the  atheist,  the  gambler,  the  criminal,  the 
liar,  the  debauchee — what  are  they  but  the  lost  coin  of 
our  church  ?  The  Church  of  England  lost  them  chiefly 
amid  the  strifes,  and  the  formalism,  and  the  sloth  of  the 
17th  and  18th  centuries,  and  she  scoffed  and  stormed 
at  John  Wesley  and  George  Whitefield  when  they  went 
to  search  for  her  lost  coins.  Happy  for  her  if  now 
her  tardy  efforts  be  not  too  late  altogether,  and  if  her 
candle  be  not  quenched  and  removed  out  of  its  place. 
May  not  the  church  in  America  take  warning  from  her 
history  ?  Let  her  take  warning.  Let  her  beware  lest 
she  "mistake  instrumentals  for  fundamentals;"  lest  she 
forget  how  few  and  broad  and  deep  are  the  great  essen- 
tial truths  of  Christianity  ;  lest  she  fall  into  the  sins  of 
partisanship  and  intolerance  ;  lest  she  be  ever  tempted 
to  teach  for  doctrines  the  commandments  of  men.  And 
when  I  say  the  Church,  I  mean  the  whole  Church.  I 
mean  the  laity  not  only  as  much  as  the  clergy,  but  more 


124 


The  Lost  Coin. 


than  the  clergy,  seeing  that  the  laity  no  less  than  the 
clergy  are  the  Church  of  God.  They  are  or  ought  to  be 
a  royal  priesthood  of  God,  and  therefore  are  even  more 
the  Church  of  God  than  the  clergy,  seeing  that  they  are 
the  more  in  number.  Lay  not  to  your  souls  the  flatter- 
ing unction  that  warnings  addressed  to  the  Church  affect 
only  the  clergy.  Make  not  for  any  neglect  or  supine- 
ness  of  yours  that  miserable  excuse.  Depend  upon  it, 
and  let  me  say  it  with  the  solemn  emphasis  of  certain 
prophecy — depend  upon  it,  the  masses  of  our  nation  will 
sooner  or  later  be  lost  to  the  church  of  their  fathers,  the 
practical  heathendom  of  our  cities  will  not  be  eyangel- 
ized,  the  Augean  stables  of  our  streets  will  not  be 
cleansed,  the  curse  of  drink  will  not  be  mitigated,  the 
plague  of  impurity  will  not  be  stayed,  the  great  social 
reforms  which  are  so  infinitely  necessary  will  never  be 
achieved,  the  national  dishonor  of  vice  and  pauperism 
and  greed  and  uncleanness  will  never  be  wiped  away, 
until  every  Christian  feels  his  own  individual  duty  ;  till 
every  good  man  is  so  anxious  to  do  his  utmost  that  he 
fears  the  battle  will  fail  where  he  is  not.  Let  not  one 
among  you  all  be  content  unless  his  conscience  tells  him 
that — apart  from  his  mere  selfish  domesticity,  and  apart 
from  his  mere  professional  duties — he  is  trying  to  do 
something,  he  is  doing  something,  by  pen,  by  voice,  by 
personal  effort,  by  the  gift  of  his  money,  by  the  exertion 
of  his  energy,  by  the  self-sacrifice  of  something  at  least 
of  his  own  comfort  and  leisure,  to  search  for,  to  recover, 
to  brighten,  to  restore  to  its  due  place  in  the  ruined 
symmetry,  the  lost  coin — that  coin  which  is  the  amalgam 
of  every  lost,  of  every  neglected  soul — in  the  bridal  or- 
nament of  the  Church  of  God. 


The  Lost  Coin. 


125 


7.  But,  ah  !  the  work  which  the  Church — the  whole 
Church,  clergy  and  laity  alike,  all  Christian  men — must 
do  in  the  world,  must  be  done  also  by  each  one  of  us  in 
our  own  lives.  May  not  that  lost  coin  be  the  lost  eter- 
nal jewel  of  our  own  soul  ?  It  is  a  frightful  thing  to 
think  that  men  may  even  gain  the  whole  world  and  yet 
lose  their  own  souls  ! — that  they  may  hoard  and  squan- 
der, and  earn,  and  possess,  and  love  tens  of  thousands  of 
wretched  gold  and  silver  coins,  which  they  can  only  use 
for  a  few  miserable  years,  and  fling  away,  and  leave  lying 
in  the  mire,  the  only  one  which  they  can  really  pos- 
sess, and  which  will  be  as  they  make  it  for  ever  and 
for  evermore.  And  oh  !  when  a  man  has  flung  away 
this  eternal  part  of  himself — when  he  has  become  a  dis- 
ensouled  body — a  hunger,  a  thirst,  a  fever,  an  appetite — a 
funnel  for  drink,  not  a  human  being — an  incarnate  lust, 
not  a  Christian  man — what  search,  what  toil,  what  anx- 
iety, yea,  what  anguish  of  struggle  should  he  undergo  ? 
bow  should  he  relight  the  candle  of  his  conscience  ? 
how  should  he  search  the  darkest  corners  of  the  house 
of  his  life  until,  by  the  aid  of  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God, 
he  find  it !  For,  if  that  be  finally  lost,  all  is  lost.  But 
remember  that  in  this  life,  at  any  rate,  it  cannot  finally 
be  lost.  While  there  is  life,  even  in  the  most  desperate 
cases,  there  is  hope.  Some  of  you  may  remember  the 
dreadful  conception  of  the  mediaeval  poet,  that  when  a 
man  has  proceeded,  step  by  step,  through  a  nameless 
multitude  of  little  sins  to  the  one  great,  awful,  final,  ir- 
revocable act  of  sin  which  is  the  practical  outcome  and 
epitome  of  all  his  life,  from  that  moment  he  is  dead — 
alive  no  longer.  One  of  yourselves,  even  a  poet  of  your 
own,  writes : 


126 


The  Lost  Coin. 


"So  fallen!   So  lost!   The  light  withdrawn 

Which  once  he  wore ! 
The  glory  from  his  gray  hairs  gone 

For  evermore ! 
All  else  is  gone !   From  those  great  eyes 

The  light  is  fled; 
When  faith  is  lost,  when  honor  dies, 

The  man  is  dead!" 

But  the  mediaeval  poet  goes  farther,  and  says,  that 
the  moment  when  in  some  frightful  crime  the  man  has 
brought  his  life  of  vice  and  sin  to  its  natural  consumma- 
tion, from  that  moment  his  soul  is  plunged  downward 
into  the  abyss,  and  his  body,  animated  not  by  his  soul, 
but  by  a  demon,  is  but  the  phantasm  and  automaton  of 
a  living  man  ;  so  that  there  are  men  and  women  whom 
we  meet  who  are  dead,  while  they  live  ;  and  heaven  and 
hell  are  here  and  now  ;  and  some  of  us  are  here  and  now 
in  heaven  ;  and  some  are  here  and  no^v  in  hell.  And 
though,  even  in  this,  there  is  a  grim  and  awful  truth, 
though,  even  in  this  place  and  at  this  moment,  an  in- 
visible demon  in  the  form  of  some  overmastering  sin 
may  be  seated  at  your  ear,  moulding  your  very  thoughts — 
may  have  clutched  you  by  the  hair,  claiming  you  as  his 
very  own — yet  the  blessed  practical  truth  remains,  that, 
while  you  live,  repentance  is  possible  ;  while  you  live 
you  may  yet  recover  the  lost  coin  of  your  eternal  peace, 
of  your  eternal  self.  Oh  !  let  each  one  of  us  light  the 
candle  of  conscience,  illuminate  the  darkest  and  most 
hidden  comers  of  our  being,  expel  the  demon  from  the 
desecrated  temple  of  our  life,  sweep  diligently  the  dusty 
and  unclean  house  of  our  soul,  and  never  cease  the  quest 
till  we  can  once  more  claim  the  lost  coin  of  our  very 
selves  as  our  own  possession  ;  as  our  own  possession,  to 


The  Lost  Coin. 


127 


give  back  to  God ;  as  our  own  possession,  no  longer  to 
squander  ruinously  in  the  devil's  service  ;  as  our  own 
possession,  far  better  worth  than  to  lie  dishonored  and 
useless  in  the  dust ;  as  our  own  possession,  to  rebrighten 
the  original  lustre  ;  as  our  own  possession,  to  make  clear 
once  more  the  regal  image  ;  as  our  own  possession,  but 
far  more  as  His  who  made  us  and  to  whom  we  belong ; 
dear  to  Him,  because,  if  but  one  soul  of  His  be  lost.  His 
church  has  lost  the  beauty  of  her  bridal  ornament,  and 
the  powers  of  evil  have  flawed  and  marred  the  glory  of 
His  celestial  work.  All  souls  are  His.  He  has  mercy 
upon  all,  for  He  can  do  all  things,  and  is  long-suffering 
that  men  should  repent ;  and  He  abhors  nothing  that 
He  has  made  or  He  would  not  have  made  it.  "  But 
thou  sparest  all,  for  they  are  Thine,  0  Lord,  thou 
lover  of  souls."  "  And  they  shall  be  mine,  said  the  Lord 
of  Hosts,  in  that  day  when  I  make  up  my  jewels  ;  and 
I  will  spare  them  as  a  man  spareth  his  own  son  that 
serveth  him." 


SERMON  IX. 


Preached  at  Holt  Trinity  Church.  Philadelphia,  Oct.  11, 1885. 


Cl^mgjs  tui^ici^  cannot  lie  ^i^afeen* 


"And  this  word,  Yet  once  more,  signifieth  the  removing  of  those 
things  that  are  shaken,  as  of  things  that  are  made,  that  those 
things  which  cannot  be  shaken  may  remain." — Heb.  xii.  27. 

Ik  this  remarkable  verse  the  wi'iter  goes  to  the  heart 
of  the  philosophy  of  religion  and  of  history.  He  de- 
clares that  through  the  ages  runs  one  evei'-in creasing 
purpose,  and  that  this  purpose  is  the  will  of  God.  He 
tells  us  that,  not  by  accident  or  by  destiny,  but  by 
Heaven's  own  Providence, 

"  The  old  order  changeth,  giving  place  to  new, 
And  God  fulfils  Himself  in  many  ways 
Lest  one  good  custom  should  corrupt  the  world." 

1.  It  is  said  that  when  the  King  of  Prussia  visited  the 
playing-fields  of  our  Eton  College,  he  said,  "  Blessed  is 
the  land  in  which  the  old  is  ever  mingled  with  the  new, 
and  the  new  ever  mingled  with  the  old."  Yes !  and 
I  add.  Blessed  is  the  Church  also  which,  like  the  scribe 
whom  Christ  blessed — instructed  in  the  Kingdom  of 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  129 

Heaven — brings  out  of  its  treasures  things  new  and 
old. 

3.  To  cling  to  the  old  when  the  new  demands  our  at- 
tention and  our  allegiance,  has  been  a  constant  error  and 
indolence  of  mankind.  They  look  back  to  the  east  when 
the  west  is  calling  them.  The  noontide  is  approaching, 
and  they  linger  amid  the  shadows  of  the  dawn.  So  it 
was  with  the  Jews  in  the  days  of  Paul  and  Apollos. 
Christ  had  come,  and  they  could  not  get  beyond  Moses. 
The  Gospel  taught  them  the  spirit  of  Christ,  and  they 
preferred  the  fires  of  Elijah.  The  Gospel  offered  them 
freedom,  and  they  hugged  yet  closer  the  yoke  of  bond- 
age. Apostles  were  preaching,  and  they  preferred  Le- 
viticus to  St.  Paul  and  St.  John.  They  were  still  trust- 
ing in  the  blood  of  bulls  and  goats,  though  Christ  had 
died.  Now,  of  this  we  may  be  always  sure.  An  unpro- 
gressive  church  is  a  dying  church ;  a  retrogressive 
church  is  a  dead  church.  Were  I  asked  what  consti- 
tutes an  extreme  peril  to  any  religious  community,  I 
should  answer,  "stagnating  opinions  rotting  in  a  dead 
theology  ; "  the  mere  human  formulae  of  one  age  me- 
chanically reproduced  and  mechanically  repeated  in  ages 
which  have  outlived  their  significance ;  the  torpor  of 
careless  assurance  ;  the  slumber  of  unreasoning  acquies- 
cence ;  the  ghastly  smooth  life  dead  at  heart  of  a  self- 
satisfied  religionism  ;  the  "  dropping  buckets  into  empty 
wells,  and  growing  old  in  drawing  nothing  out."  God 
himself,  as  this  text  declares,  is  ever  leading  us  onward, 
upward,  forward.  "  The  living  sap  of  to-day  outgrows 
the  dead  rind  of  yesterday."  Therefore,  in  every  true 
and  living  church  there  must  be  freedom  and  there 

must  be  progress.    Freedom  and  progress  are  the  law  of 
9 


130     Things  which  cannot  be  S 'taken. 

true  life.  When  the  great  tide  of  truth  is  ever  advanc- 
ing, even  children  are  not  so  foolish  as  to  linger  among 
the  dank  seaweeds  upon  the  oozy  shore. 

3.  Apollos — if  he  was  the  author  of  this  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews — tells  us  that  there  are  systems,  doctrines,  in- 
stitutions, organizations,  which  God  continually  shakes 
to  the  ground  in  the  earthquakes  of  history.  He  does 
so  because  they  have  had  their  day,  and  done  their  work; 
because  they  have  become  obstructive  and  obselete  ;  be- 
cause men  are  beginning  to  make  them  into  idols  and 
fetishes ;  because  men  thrust  them  between  their  souls 
and  Him  ;  because  they  put  their  trust  in  them  and  not 
in  Him  ;  because  they  are  instrumentals  not  funda- 
mentals, means  not  ends.  These  things  are  but  shadows, 
and  men  take  them  for  the  substance.  These  things  are 
quivering,  unreal,  evanescent  as  the  reflection  of  the 
bulrush  upon  the  shimmering  wave ;  but  there  are  other 
things  which  are  unshakable  and  eternal  as  are  the 
cedars  of  Libanus,  yea,  as  the  very  crags  on  which  they 
stand.  In  eras  of  change,  such  as  this  is,  such  as  the 
Keformation  was,  men  need  to  be  reminded  that  there 
are  some  foundations  which  stand  sure,  having  on  them 
the  double  seal  of  God  ; — "the  Lordknoweth  them  that 
are  His,"  and  "let  him  that  nameth  the  name  of  Christ 
depart  from  iniquity."  Those  are  foundations  which  no 
earthquake  can  make  to  tremble,  much  less  rock  to  the 
ground.  Such  was  the  case  in  the  days  of  Christ,  and 
of  the  great  apostle  St.  Paul.  The  Jews  thought  that 
their  temple,  and  their  sacrifices,  and  their  ritual,  and 
their  priesthood,  and  their  Pentateuch-legislation  were 
perfect,  eternal,  and  divine.  Christ  taught  them  that 
they  were  imperfect  and  transitory,  and  vanishing  away. 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  131 


That  was  why  they  crucified  Him.  The  cross  was  the 
reward  of  Pharisaista  to  the  Son  of  God.  And  as  it  was 
with  the  Master  so  shall  it  be  with  the  servants.  Where- 
ever  any  great  human  soul  utters  new  truth  there  ia 
once  more  the  shadow  of  Calvary.  But  God  not  only 
gives,  but  gives  back ;  and  what  He  gives  back  is  better 
than  what  was  taken  away.  The  earthquake  can  rock  no 
sure  foundation.  It  is  upon  one  or  two  of  those  sure 
foundations  that  I  propose,  briefly,  to  speak  to  you  to-day. 

4.  In  times  like  these,  one  often  meets  persons — 
generally  young  men  and  young  women — who,  mistak- 
ing their  ignorance  for  knowledge,  and  their  cleverness 
for  genius,  are  fond  of  telling  others,  and  half  persuad- 
ing themselves,  that  they  have  lost  all  faith  in  every- 
thing. Clergymen  in  England  not  unfrequently  receive 
letters  or  calls  from  such  persons,  who,  having  very  little 
to  do,  come  to  them  as  though  this  eczema  of  disbelief 
were  some  deep-seated  malady,  or  as  though  others  could 
heal  it,  while  they  themselves  have  not  even  tried  to  heal 
it  by  the  appointed  means  which  God  has  put  in  their 
own  power.  Now,  when  doubt  is  sincere  and  agonizing, 
as  it  sometimes  is,  it  is  our  duty  to  sympathize  with  it. 
We  would  spare  no  pains,  no  self-denial,  if  we  could  in 
any  way  help  those  who  are  suffering  from  it.  But  a 
good  deal  of  tliis  kind  of  scepticism  is  not  genuine  ;  it 
springs  from  vanity  and  idleness ;  from  the  lack  of 
serious  aims  and  serious  occupations.  It  is  the  spurious 
offspring  of  struggling  self-conceit  and  self-disgust.  And 
when  this  is  the  case  it  is  not  worth  wasting  argument 
upon.  It  needs  a  moral,  not  an  intellectual  cure,  and  it 
would  be  altogether  beneath  contempt,  if,  out  of  this 
mere  Sadduceeism  of  lath  and  plaster,  the  devil  did  not 


132     Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken, 

sometimes  construct  the  prison-liouse  of  human  souls. 
Happily,  life  in  most  cases  cures  this  superficial  disease. 
Life  sooner  or  later  tries  the  nerves  of  these  intellectual 
young  people.  Life  knocks  the  nonsense  out  of  them. 
Like  the  creature  in  the  poem,  they  will  philosophize  at 
ease  till  the  thunder  sends  them  terrified  to  the  foot- 
stool of  His  mercy,  whom  they  have  thought  it  a  proof  of 
fine  intellect  to  deny.  It  is  said  of  one  of  the  Cato  Street 
conspirators  that  he  talked  flippant  atheism  in  a  loud 
and  arrogant  voice  so  long  as  visitors  were  present,  but 
the  moment  they  were  gone,  the  poor  wretch  flung  him- 
self on  his  knees  in  an  agony  of  prayer. 

5.  When,  however,  disbelief  is  not  the  mere  efilores- 
cence  of  idle  wantonness,  but  is  real  and  terrible,  I 
think  that  the  very  first  advice  which  we  must  give  to 
those  who  desire  to  recover  a  lost  faith  is  that  they 
should  most  earnestly  consider  whether  there  be  not, 
in  their  own  hearts  and  their  own  lives,  some  irresisti- 
ble obstacle  and  impediment  to  the  growth  of  faith. 
The  ice  must  be  melted  before  the  stream  can  flow,  and 
while  "the  air  burns  frore,"  the  waters  will  be  fixed  and 
motionless.  The  experience  of  the  world  has  grasped 
this  truth.  "  The  light  of  heaven,"  says  the  Chinese 
proverb,"  cannot  shine  into  an  inverted  bowl."  "  The 
Kusty  Shield,"  says  the  fable,  "prayed  to  the  Sun,  and 
said,  '  Shine  thou  on  me  ; '  and  the  Sun  answered  it, 
'First  see  that  thou  thyself  art  polished  from  thy 
rust. ' "  My  friends,  a  mind  that  is  not  candid,  a  soul 
that  is  given  up  to  sin,  cannot  fail  to  sink  into  a 
real,  if  not  into  an  avowed  infidelity.  There  is  too 
often  a  secret  disbelief  of  unspiritual  middle  life,  caused 
by  worldliness  and  forgetfulness  of  God.     It  is  the 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  133 


demon  that  walketli  in  the  noonday.  The  story  is 
told — whether  with  truth  or  not,  I  cannot  say — that  in 
the  eighteenth  century,  when  atheism  was  almost  uni- 
versally professed  in  polished  and  fashionable  circles,  a 
body  of  men  who  wished  to  be  infidels — wished  to  give 
themselves  up  to  the  unbridled  indulgence  of  their 
passions — confessed  that  they  could  not  get  rid  of  the 
scruples  of  the  religion  which  they  had  disavowed,  or 
of  the  stings  of  that  conscience  which  testified  to  Him 
whose  minister  it  was.  And  there  were  some  who 
whispered  to  them  the  devil's  counsel :  "Go  to  the  com- 
munion, and  take  the  sacrament  of  the  Lord's  Supper, 
with  the  deliberate  intention  of  going  straight  from  it 
to  the  commission  of  a  deadly  sin,  and  then  you  will 
find  that  your  scruples  have  vanished."  They  did  so, 
and  the  foretold  result  occurred.  Their  conscience 
troubled  them  no  more — for  a  time ;  they  had  seared 
it,  as  with  a  hot  iron  ;  they  had,  as  it  were,  stabbed  it 
to  the  heft ;  they  had  strangled  it  with  deadly  insult, 
and  for  a  time  it  did  not  stir.  They  had  deliberately 
quenched  within  them  the  influence  of  the  spirit  of 
God.  How  could  the  issue  be  doubtful  ?  When  Antio- 
chus  Epiphanes  wished  to  desecrate  the  Temple  of 
Jerusalem,  the  very  first  thing  he  did  was  to  remove 
from  its  shrine  the  golden  candlestick.  It  is  even  so 
with  the  soul.  Quench  the  Light  of  God  within  it ; 
plunge  it  in  that  darkness  which  is  indispensable  to 
deeds  of  evil  ;  and  soon  no  star  of  faith,  liowever  small, 
will  gleam  upon  its  dolorous  midnight.  Let  it  then  be 
understood  that  all  advice,  that  all  argument,  must 
necessarily  be  thrown  away  upon  that  disbelief  which, 
whether  it  be  silent  or  demonstrative,  needs  a  moral. 


134      Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken. 


not  an  intellectual  cure.  To  such  a  soul  there  is  no 
message,  but  that  which  spoke  to  Nicodemus  :  "Except 
a  man  be  born  again  of  water  and  of  the  Spirit,  he  can- 
not enter  into  the  kingdom  of  God."  And  that  which 
He  spoke  to  the  young,  ruler  :  "  If  thou  wouldst  enter 
into  life,  keep  the  commandments." 

6.  When,  however,  there  is  not  this  fatal  moral  ob- 
stacle— when  the  soul,  though  it  grope  in  darkness,  still 
desires  the  light — when  it  has  by  no  means  uttered  the 
fatal  choice,  "  Evil  be  thou  my  good,"  is  there  nothing 
that  we  can  then  say  to  it  ?  Yes,  we  can  say  this : 
"Begin  with  what  you  do  know;  with  what  you  do 
believe  ;  build  yourself  upon  that ;  be  true,  be  utterly 
true  to  that."  People  sometimes  worry  themselves  be- 
cause they  cannot  believe  this  or  that,  when  this  or  that 
has  in  reality  nothing  to  do  with  religion  ;  ought  never 
to  have  been  regarded  as  any  essential  part  of  it ;  has 
never  been  insisted  on  by  the  Universal  Church,  or 
required  of  any  man  as  necessary  to  salvation.  You 
have  doubts,  it  may  be,  about  this  or  that  form  of 
church  organization  ;  about  this  or  that  theory  of  the 
sacraments ;  about  this  or  that  anathema  of  the  domi- 
nant popular  opinion  which  may  chance  to  arrogate  to 
itself  the  exclusive  claim  to  be  orthodox  ;  about  many 
human  dogmas  which  have  been  taught  as  infallible 
gospel  truth  by  this  or  that  sect,  and  this  or  that  party  ; 
about  views  of  God  which  seem  to  you  more  suitable  to 
views  of  Moloch,  and  which,  though  utterly  foundation- 
less,  yet  are  taught  with  authority;  about  doctrines  of 
the  future  life  which  go  far  beyond  the  warrant  of  reve- 
lation. Or,  again,  you  feel  uncertainties  about  parts  of 
the  Old  Testament ;  about  Balaam's  ass,  or  the  sun 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  135 


standing  still,  or  a  dead  man  being  raised  to  life  by 
touching  Elisha's  bones,  or  that  Eden  was  an  actual  gar- 
den, with  an  actual  serpent  in  it ;  or  a  thousand  other 
things.  Very  well :  study  these  questions  humbly,  rev- 
erently, impartially  ;  get  the  best  account  you  can  of 
them ;  but  if  nothing  satisfies  you,  why  I  say  to  you,  as 
brave  old  Martin  Luther  said,  then  let  them  go.  "We 
cannot,"  he  said,  "prevent  the  birds  of  the  air  from  fly- 
ing about  our  heads ;  but  no  man  need  suffer  them  to 
build  their  nests  in  his  beard."  These  questions  have  to 
do  with  criticism,  with  archaeology,  with  definitions  of 
authenticity  and  inspiration  and  Semitic  metaphor,  and 
many  other  complex  matters.  To  hold  any  particular 
view  about  them  will  not  make  you,  by  the  millionth 
part  of  a  scruple,  a  worse  or  a  better  man.  They  have, 
therefore,  nothing  to  do  with  religion.  They  are  not 
"generally  necessary  to  salvation."  There  is  not  one 
word  about  them  in  the  Apostles'  Creed.  There  is  not 
one  word  about  them  in  the  Nicene  Creed.  There  is  not 
one  word  about  them  even  in  the  much  later  and  much 
less  authoritative  Athanasian  Creed.  There  is  not  one 
word  about  them  in  the  Thirty-nine  Articles.  And, 
what  is  immensely  more  important,  there  is  not  one 
word  about  them  in  the  teaching  of  Christ.  At  the  bar 
of  Judgment  you  will  not  be  cross-examined  about  any 
such  questions,  but  the  questions  which  will  be  put  to 
you  are  infinitely  more  searching  and  more  significant. 
They  will  be.  Have  you  been  pure  or  impure,  holy  or 
unholy  ?  Have  you  kept  your  body  in  temperance,  sober- 
ness, and  chastity  ?  Have  you  been  inflexibly  honest,  or 
had  some  conventional,  professional  standard  only  of 
what  is  ionest  1    Have  you  told  the  truth,  or  delighted 


136      Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken. 


in  lies  ?  Have  your  words  been  sweet  and  gentle,  or 
has  the  poison  of  asps  been  under  your  lips  ?  Have  you 
loved  God  with  all  your  heart  ?  Have  you  loved  your 
neighbor  as  yourself  ?  Did  your  life  leave  the  moral 
standard  of  the  world  a  little  better,  or  a  little  worse  ? 
These — these — these  things,  and  not  abstract  opinions, 
or  theories  about  which  parties  hate  each  other,  and  re- 
vile each  other,  and  intrigue  against  each  other — these 
are  the  things  which  affect  salvation.  The  only  real  ques- 
tion of  religion  for  you  is.  Am  I  sincere  ?  Do  I  love  the 
truth  ?  Do  I  love  the  light  ?  Am  I  striving  ever  more 
and  more  to  live  in  the  spirit  of  the  beatitudes  ?  Am  I 
doing  justly  and  loving  mercy,  and  walking  humbly 
with  my  God  ?  Are  not  these  questions  searching 
enough  for  you — terrible  enough  ?  Can  you  answer 
them  ?  If  you  can,  happy  are  you  !  If  you  cannot,  the 
other  questions  are  for  you  but  as  dust  in  the  balance. 
Turn  from  the  non-essential  things  which  can  be 
shaken,  or  which  for  you  have  been  shaken,  to  the 
things  which  cannot  be  shaken,  and  which  remain. 
Spiritually,  as  well  as  intellectually  and  morally,  turn 
from  the  shadow  and  face  the  sun. 

7.  Begin,  above  all,  with  God.  You  believe  in  God — 
you  believe  that  He  is  ;  and,  believing  that  He  is,  I 
hope  that  you  go  at  least  as  far  as  the  demons,  who,  as 
St.  James  tells  us,  not  only  believe  but  tremble.  I  say 
that  you  believe  in  a  God  ;  for  apart  from  self-deception 
and  braggadocio,  I  do  not  believe  that  there  is  one  per- 
son in  a  million  who  does  not.  But  if  you  meet  such  a 
person — and  just  as  there  is  no  accounting  for  the  ab- 
normal depravity  of  some  men's  iniquity,  so  there  is  no 
accounting  for  the  astonishing  aberrations  of  some  men's 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  137 

intellects — if  you  do  meet  with  an  atheist,  do  not  let  him 
entangle  yoa  in  mere  side-issues  of  Old  Testament  criti- 
cism, which  he  will  try  to  do.  Never  defend  in  the 
name  of  religion  anything  which,  in  your  conscience, 
you  feel  to  be  indefensible  except  by  casuistry  and  arti- 
ficial hypotheses.  God  is  a  God  of  burning  truth.  Can 
we,  dare  we,  lie  for  Him  ?  or  go  before  Him  with  a  lie 
in  our  right  hand  ?  As  to  many  points  which  infidel 
lecturers  attack  in  the  Bible  we  must  learn  the  wise 
maxim  of  the  Rabbis  :  "  Learn  to  say,  'I  do  not  know.' " 
But  leaving  all  secondary,  unessential,  and  uncertain 
questions,  ask  how — if  he  does  not  believe  in  a  God — the 
infidel  can  solve  these  seven  unanswerable  questions,  the 
force  of  which  you  will  see  in  proportion  to  your  knowl- 
edge of  the  laws  of  science,  and  with  which  science  itself 
has  inexorably  confronted  him. 

First.  Where  did  matter  come  from  ?  Can  a  dead 
thing  create  its  dead  self  ? 

Second.  What  is  the  origin  of  motion?  Can  a  dead 
thing  move  its  dead  self  ?  Launch  but  one  tiny  planet 
upon  its  orbit,  nay,  set  one  water-drop  a-rolling,  or  let 
there  be  a  flutter  no  greater  than  the  quivering  of  a 
gnat's  wing  in  the  eternal  calm,  and  you  may  account  if 
you  will  for  all  the  rest.  But  who  gave  the  first  impulse 
to  moveless  inertia  ?    Whence  came  the  first  force  ? 

Third.  Where  did  life  come  from  ?  Did  life  in  dead 
matter  create  itself  ?  Given  the  first  spark  of  life  which 
tingled  in  the  brute  mass,  and  you  may  account  for 
everything  ;  but  whence,  save  from  the  finger-tip  of 
Omnipotence,  thrilled  that  creative  flash  of  divine  vi- 
tality ?  Was  the  first  bacillus  or  the  first  bacteria 
omnipotent  enough  to  create  itself  ? 


138     Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken. 


Fourth.  Whence  came  the  exquisite  order  and  design 
in  nature  ?  "Will  you  ask  us  to  believe  that  this  infini- 
tude of  exquisite  adaptations  sprang  from  a  congeries  of 
accidents,  or  a  concourse  of  fortuitous  atoms  ?  If  any 
one  were  to  tell  us  that  nobody  had  ever  made  types,  and 
that  no  one  called  Dante  or  Shakespeare  or  Milton  ever 
existed,  but  that  millions  of  printed  letters  accidentally 
assumed  their  peculiar  shapes  and  fortuitously  shook 
themselves  together  into  the  Divine  Comedy  of  Dante, 
the  Plays  of  Shakespeare,  and  the  Poems  of  Milton,  you 
would  think  that  the  man  had  utterly  lost  his  reason. 
Yet  he  would  be  less  of  a  madman  than  he  who  tells  us 
that  the  feathers  on  the  gorgeous  wing  of  the  butterfly, 
and  the  iridescence  on  the  dove's  neck,  and  the  crystalline 
humor  and  nervous  retina  of  the  human  eye,  and  the 
delicately  pencilled  flowers,  and  the  leaves  of  illimitable 
forests,  and  the  sands,  and  seas,  and  the  exquisite  rosy 
shells  upon  the  shore,  and  the  lamellar  crystals  of  the 
snow,  and  the  heavens,  and  the  stars  also — danced  into 
accidental  symmetry,  and  from  a  mass  of  conflicting 
atoms  evolved  alike  their  own  dread  magnificence,  and 
the  sense  of  sublimity  which  they  derive  from  the  souls 
of  mortal  men. 

Fifth.  Whence  came  consciousness  ?  Can  blind 
chance  think?  Can  dead  matter  evolve  a  sense  of  its 
own  existence,  and  frame  objects  to  an  end  ? 

Sixth.  Who  gave  you  free-will  ?  Dead  particles  of 
matter  acting  under  the  impulse  of  chance,  which  is 
blind,  and  deaf,  and  dumb — brute  forces  which  are 
strong  as  fate,  inexorable  as  tyranny,  merciless  as  death 
— could  hardly  have  given  themselves  the  power  to 
thwart  and  control  themselves,  as  we  do.    We  have 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  139 


bodies,  but  we  are  spirits.  In  other  words,  we  have  in 
us  something  infinitely  superior  to  matter,  i.  e.,  spirit ; 
and  spirit  is  and  can  be  nothing  but  the  breath  of  a  God 
and  a  pure  effluence  from  the  Spirit  of  the  Almighty. 
Even  the  heathen  poet  could  say  :  "  There  is  a  God 
within  us." 

"  Est  Deus  in  nobis  agitante  calescimus  illo." 

Seventh.  Whence  came  Conscience  ?  Did  dead  mat- 
ter educe  the  divine  sense  of  right  and  wrong  ?  Did 
a  concourse  of  atoms  create  that  primeval  vicegerent  of 
God,  "  a  prophet  in  its  inspiration,  a  monarch  in  its 
peremptoriness,  a  priest  in  its  sanctions  and  anathe- 
mas ?  " — he  then  who  says  that  there  is  no  God  does 
not  solve  even  the  most  elementary  difficulty  of  the 
human  mind,  while  he  creates  difficulties  a  million  times 
more  numerous,  and  a  million  times  more  insoluble.  He 
talks  simply  stupendous  nonsense  and  abysmal  folly. 
If  there  be  one  truth  which  more  than  another  has  come 
home  with  immense  conviction  to  the  conscience  of 
mankind,  it  is  the  truth  that  there  is  a  God.  The  faith 
of  mankind  rests  on  facts  of  every  description,  and 
drawn  from  every  quarter.  From  the  inward,  men  have 
passed  to  the  outward  ;  from  the  outward  to  the  divine ; 
and  alike  the  choir  of  heaven  and  the  furniture  of  earth, 
alike  the  universe  of  stars  and  the  world  of  life  which 
peoples  with  miracles  a  single  water-drop,  echo  from 
without  the  monitions  breathed  by  the  Spirit  of  God 
from  within  us,  that  this  God  is  our  God,  and  shall  be 
our  guide  unto  death.  This  is  forever  one  of  the  things 
which  cannot  be  shaken  and  which  remain. 

These  proofs,  then,  are  a  linked  chain  of  certainty  : 


140     Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken. 

"  Lasting  links 

From  highest  heaven  let  down. 
The  flowers  still  faithful  to  their  stem. 

Their  fellowship  renew  ; 
The  stems  are  faithful  to  the  root, 

That  worket'h  out  of  view  ; 
And  to  the  rock  the  root  adheres 

In  every  fibre  true  ; 
Close  clings  to  earth  the  living  rock, 

Tho'  threatening  still  to  fall ; 
The  earth  is  constant  to  her  sphere. 

And  God  upholds  them  all  1 " 

I.  Now  to  one  wlio  grasps  what  the  word  God  means, 
and  believes  that  there  is  a  God,  what  a  tremendous 
belief  it  is  !  How  does  it  contain  the  very  quintessence 
of  all  religion,  and  with  what  certainty  does  it  lead  to 
further  truths  of  immeasurable  grandeur,  truths  which 
cannot  be  shaken  and  remain  ! 

For  with  the  belief  in  a  God  thus  arrived  at,  follows  at 
once  the  belief  in  the  divine  Providence — that  He  made 
us  ;  that  He  is  our  Father  ;  that  we  are  the  people  of 
His  pasture  and  the  sheep  of  His  hand.  And  with  this 
consciousness  of  our  relation  to  God,  Conscience  of 
necessity  awakens.  The  visible  things  of  God  reveal 
the  invisible.  When  Daniel  Webster  was  asked  what 
thought  overwhelmed  him  with  the  deepest  sense  of 
sublimity,  he  instantly  gave  the  answer  :  "  The  thought 
of  my  immediate  accountability  to  God."  And  that  is 
Duty.  It  is  "the  voice  of  God  in  the  soul  of  man." 
The  spirit  of  man  is  the  candle  of  the  Lord,  and  it  is  a 
light  which  lighteth  every  man  that  is  born  into  the 
world.  And  by  the  light  of  this  spirit  we  recognize  at 
once  the  law  of  duty.    Grander  than  the  starry  heavens 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  141 

above  becomes  the  moral  law  within.  We  bow  before 
its  eternal  majesty.  Uplifting  in  our  souls  the  naked 
rule,  "I  ought,"  it  at  once  commands  our  reverence, 
if  not  always  or  at  once  our  obedience,  and  before  its 
awful  mandate  the  passions  are  dumb,  however  secretly 
they  may  rebel.  But  when  we  fully  accept  that  law 
of  duty  as  the  law  of  our  lives ;  when  on  reason  we 
build  resolve  ;  when  we  have  learnt,  in  the  strength  of 
the  spirit  which  Christ  has  poured  forth  in  our  hearts, 
to  exclaim,  "I  ought,"  "I  can,"  "I  will,"— then  life 
is  redeemed  from  its  insignificance  and  its  triviality, 
and  becomes  a  solemn  and  sacred  thing. 

II.  God  and  Duty,  then,  are  not  these  immense  foun- 
dations on  which  to  build  the  superstructure  of  religion 
and  the  happiness  of  holy  and  obedient  lives.  But, 
once  more,  to  him  who  builds  on  these  foundations 
there  comes,  and  surely  must  come,  the  third,  which 
cannot  be  shaken  and  must  remain  in  the  simple  Gospel 
of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  The  Gospel  of  God  is  the 
necessary  correlative  of  the  sin  of  man.  God,  who  cre- 
ated a  frail  race,  would  not  be  God  if  He  had  left  to 
their  fate  a  fallen  race.  For  centuries  He  spake  in 
times  past  unto  the  fathers  by  the  prophets.  In  these 
last  days,  in  this  final  dispensation.  He  has  spoken  to 
us  by  His  Son.  To  the  Gentiles  He  left  not  Himself 
without  witness,  giving  them  rain  from  heaven  and 
fruitful  seasons,  filling  their  hearts  with  food  and  glad- 
ness, until  their  own  poets  recognized  that  we  are  also 
His  offspring.  To  the  chosen  people  He  gave  the  Ten 
Words  of  His  law,  and  sent  them  prophet  after  prophet, 
rising  up  early  and  sending  them.  It  was  all  in  vain. 
Gentile  and  Jew  alike  rebelled.    The  Gentiles  plunged 


142      Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken. 

themselves  into  the  deadly  fascinations  of  sensual  wick- 
edness ;  they  corrupted  themselves,  like  brute  beasts 
which  have  no  understanding,  in  things  which  they  nat- 
urally knew,  and  perished  in  their  own  corruption. 
The  Jews  preferred  spurious  forms  of  religion ;  they 
broke  God's  law,  despised  His  judgments,  slew  His 
prophets.  Adam  sinned  and  was  expelled  from  Para- 
dise ;  Cain  fell  and  was  driven  forth  a  murderer,  with  a 
brand  upon  his  brow.  The  whole  world  went  astray, 
and  had  barely  been  baptized  in  the  lustral  waters  of  the 
flood  when  Noah  fell  into  drunkenness,  and  his  sons 
apostatized  into  the  rebellious  insolence  of  their  at- 
tempted Babels.  The  chosen  race  was  called  in  Abra- 
ham, it  went  astray  in  Jacob,  in  Esau,  in  the  Patriarchs, 
and  it  was  plunged  into  the  burning  fiery  furnace  of 
Egyptian  bondage.  Then  out  of  Egypt  God  called  His 
Son.  He  redeemed  His  people  from  bondage,  led  them 
through  the  wilderness,  taught  His  ways  unto  Moses, 
His  works  unto  the  children  of  Israel.  The  long  train- 
ing of  the  people  failed  ;  another  ruin,  another  exile  was 
necesary.  But  meanwhile  there  has  been  bom  in  their 
hearts  the  sure  and  certain  hope  of  a  Divine  Deliverer 
of  mankind,  and  at  last,  in  the  fulness  of  the  times, 
God  sent  forth  His  Son,  bom  of  a  woman,  born  under 
the  law,  to  redeem  them  that  were  under  the  law,  and, 
with  them,  to  save  mankind.  The  belief  in  Christ  is 
but  a  necessary  corollary  of  the  belief  in  God,  and  the 
belief  in  Christ  is  the  belief  not  only  in  a  Father  who 
created,  and  in  a  Son  who  redeemed,  but  also  in  the 
Spirit  who  sanctifieth  us.  It  is  a  belief  not  only  in  Je- 
hovah Nissi  "the  Lord  our  banner,"  and  Jehovah  Jireh 
"the  Lord  will  provide,"  and  Jehovah  Shammah  "the 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  143 

Lord  is  there,"  but  also  in  Jehovah  Tsidkenu  "the 
Lord  our  righteousness. "  It  is  a  belief  in  Immanuel, 
God  with  us  ;  it  is  a  belief  in  Pentecost  and  God  within 
us.  The  belief  in  the  primal  miracles  of  creation — the 
creation  of  matter,  of  life,  of  free-will — makes  it  easy, 
makes  it  necessary  to  accept  the  supreme  miracle  of  the 
Incarnation  and  Kesurrection  of  the  Son  of  God. 

"  Yes!  one  unquestioned  truth  we  read, 
All  doubt  beyond,  all  fear  above. 
No  crackling  pile,  no  curious  creed 
Can  bum  or  blot  it— God  is  Love  I " 

And  as  in  the  belief  in  God  and  the  realization  of  the 
moral  law  we  have  the  essence  of  the  Old  Covenant,  so 
too  in  the  belief  in  Christ — the  Incarnation  of  Christ, 
the  character  of  Christ,  the  example  of  Christ,  the  Cross 
of  Christ,  the  Resurrection  of  Christ,  the  gift  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  of  Christ — we  have  the  very  essence  of  the  New 
Covenant.  This,  involving,  as  it  does,  the  love  of  God 
with  all  the  heart,  and  the  love  of  our  neighbor  as  our- 
selves, is  indeed  the  law  and  the  prophets.  Do  not,  I 
entreat  you,  confuse  the  truth  of  Christianity  with 
masses  of  disputed  questions,  or  stake  the  existence  of 
Christianity  on  the  commandments  and  traditions  of 
men,  which  this  or  that  party,  or  this  or  that  theolo- 
gian may  insist  on  as  essential,  whether  they  belong  to 
the  Church  of  Eome  or  to  the  Church  of  England,  or 
to  all  the  opinion-worship  of  a  hundred  petty  schisms. 
Do  not  confuse  Christianity  with  the  party  theories  or 
party  dogmas  which  the  current  arrogance  or  the  cur- 
rent ignorance  of  such  and  such  schools  or  such  and  such 
preachers  may  choose  to  identify  with  the  perverted  name 


144     Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken. 

of  orthodoxy.  Christianity  does  not  in  the  smallest  degree 
depend  on  this  or  that  particular  view  about  dogmas,  or 
mysteries,  or  church  organization,  or  sacramental  effi- 
cacy. Christianity  is  not  what  Augustine  taught,  or 
Anselm  taught,  or  Thomas  Aquinas,  or  Bishop  Pearson, 
or  Wesley — it  is  what  Christ  taught.  The  heart  of 
Christianity  is  Christ ;  the  life  of  Christianity  is  Christ. 
The  Christian  is  a  Christ-man.  It  has  not  pleased  God 
to  give  us  the  way  of  salvation  either  in  dialectics  or  in 
details.  The  Gospel  is  a  very  different  thing  from  sys- 
tems of  theology,  whether  they  were  written  by  Peter 
Lombard  or  Jonathan  Edwards.  Do  you  believe  in  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  ?  Do  you  love  Christ  ?  Do  you 
keep  the  commandments  of  Christ  ?  Do  you  love  your 
brother  as  yourself  for  Christ's  sake,  and  because  for 
him,  as  for  you,  Christ  died  ?  And,  loving  Christ,  do 
you  keep  His  commandments  ?  Are  you  pure  in  heart  ? 
Are  you  kind  and  loving  to  all  ?  Do  you  hate  and 
abhor  all  lies,  whether  they  be  society  lies  or  religious 
lies  ?  If  so,  you  are  a  Christian,  and,  as  far  as  your  sal- 
vation is  concerned,  it  matters  less  than  nothing  what 
are  the  special  intellectual  or  traditional  views  on 
which  you  may  happen  to  pride  yourselves.  In  heaven 
there  are  neither  Catholics,  nor  Anglicans,  nor  Dissent- 
ers, nor  party  men  of  any  kind,  whether  High,  Low, 
or  Broad  ;  there  are  only  saints,  x.  e.,  holy  men — only 
saints  and  forgiven  sinners.  The  only  distinction  there 
recognized  is  neither  the  Damnamus  of  Augsburg  nor  the 
Anathema  of  Trent,  but  this  only  :  Is  he  a  true  Christian 
man  ?  The  meek,  the  just,  the  devout,  the  pious,  the 
loving,  the  holy — whatever  priests  or  false  prophets  may 
teach — are  all  of  one  religion.    Priests  may  bum,  and 


Things  which  cannot  be  Shaken.  145 


churches  may  excommunicate  them,  but  in  heaven  they 
shall  all  meet  and  recognize  each  other,  when  their 
special  masks  and  liveries  are  stripped  away.  So  taugbi 
William  Penn,  so  taught  the  founder  of  this,  your  City 
of  Brotherly  Love,  the  city  which  he  founded  as  a  holy 
experiment,  which  it  would  rest  with  you  to  ruin  or  to 
fulfil. 

Time  does  not  at  all  permit  me  to  work  out  any  of 
these  thoughts,  but  take,  I  beseech  you,  the  central 
thought :  Clear  the  ruins,  build  on  foundations.  Some 
things,  in  age  after  age,  have  been  and  they  will  be 
shaken.  God  has  said,  "Yet  once  more  I  will  shake 
the  heavens,  and  the  earth,  and  all  nations ; "  but  there 
are  some  things  real,  solid,  eternal,  which  cannot  be 
shaken,  and  which  for  ever  and  ever  will  remain. 

' '  I  have  seen 
A  pine  in  Italy,  that  cast  its  shadow 
Athwart  a  cataract ;  firm  stood  the  pine, 
The  cataract  shook  the  shadow." 

Shadows  of  theory,  shadows  of  opinion,  shadows  of 
tradition,  shadows  of  hierarchy  and  party  may  be 
shaken.    Christ  remains. 

If  we  are  Christians,  if  we  are  sincere  and  good  men, 
there  is  nothing  that  can  terrify  us.  There  be  many 
which  say,  "  Who  will  show  us  any  good  ?"  Lord,  lift 
Thou  up  the  light  of  Thy  countenance  upon  us.  We 
believe  in  the  Father  who  created,  in  the  Son  who  re- 
deemed, in  the  Holy  Ghost  who  sanctifleth  us  !  That 
faith  is  sufficient,  is  more  than  sufficient  whereby  to 
live,  wherein  to  die.    In  that  belief,  dear  brethren, 

"Arise  and  bless  Him  ere  your  worship  cease, 
Then  lowly  kneeling  wait  His  word  of  Peace. " 


SERMON  X. 

Preached  at  St.  John's  Chukch,  Washington,  Oct.  18,  1885. 


Mtp  tl^e  CommanDmentis/' 


"But  if  thou  wilt  enter  into  life,  keep  the  commandments."— 
Matt.  xix.  17. 

Theee  is  something  inexpressibly  tonching  in  the 
simple,  natural,  deep-reaching  narrative  of  the  young 
ruler  who  came  to  Christ  with  hurried  eagerness — run- 
ning, kneeling,  prostrating  himself,  because  he  knew  that 
Jesus  was  about  to  depart  from  Galilee,  and  panting 
forth  his  passionate  question,  "Good  Master,  what  shall 
I  do  to  inherit  eternal  life  ?  "  Would  to  God  that  many 
of  us  who  are  here  present  had  but  so  much  of  the 
young  ruler's  spirit  as  would  lead  us  to  desire  with  him 
to  know  how  we  may  inherit  eternal  life  !  Of  all  this 
multitude,  how  many  have  come  here  with  that  one  in- 
tense and  pure  desire  ? 

What  shall  I  do  to  inherit  eternal  life  ?  Surely  it 
is  a  tremendous  question  !  No  human  language  can 
formulate  any  question  of  more  momentous  imjjort. 
And  perhaps  some  perplexed  and  weary  soul  among 
you  thinks,  "What  would  I  not  give,  if  but  for  one 


"Keep  the  Commandments."  i^y 

hour — ^yea,  but  for  a  few  moments  only,  I  could  see 
Jesus  ;  could  hurry  up  to  Him  as  that  youth  did ; 
could  fling  myself  on  my  knees,  yea,  on  my  face,  before 
Him ;  could  cling  to  the  hem  of  His  gai'ment,  and  de- 
tain His  steps ;  could  cry.  Lord,  Lord,  I  am  sinful ;  I 
am  tired  of  myself,  tired  of  the  world ;  tired  of  its 
shams  and  of  its  injustice ;  tired  of  its  bread  which  is 
not  bread  ;  tired  of  its  cisterns — broken  cisterns,  which 
will  hold  no  water  for  my  thirst ;  tired  of  the  regret, 
the  struggle,  the  failing ;  tired  of  the  years  which  the 
locust  hath  eaten ;  oh,  my  Lord,  this  life  is  not  life,  it 
is  death;  what  must  I  do,  oh  !  what  must  I  do  to  in- 
herit eternal  life  ?  "  We  have  had  so  many  years  to  live  ; 
is  there  any  one  of  us  all  who  would  not  give  up,  say, 
half  of  his  remaining  time  on  earth,  if  only,  escaping 
from  the  fret,  the  vulgarity,  the  littleness  of  life,  he 
might  have  one  hour — one  half-hour,  with  his  Lord  ? 

So  we  say.  My  friends,  is  it  true  ?  Do  we  long  for  it? 
do  we  yearn  for  it  so  much  ?  Do  yon  say.  Oh,  that  I 
could  pour  forth  my  burdened  heart  in  tears  upon  His 
feet !  oh,  that  I  could  but  see  Him  !  oh,  that  I  knew 
where  I  might  find  Him  !  oh,  that  I  could  give  Him 
something  to  show  my  love  !  Ah,  but  if  we  long  for 
it,  we  may  have  it — here,  now.  Would  you  weep  at 
His  feet  ?  You  may  weep  like  John  upon  His  breast. 
Do  you  long  to  give  Him  something  ?  You  may  give 
Him,  if  you  like,  everything  that  He  cares  for.  Do 
you  want  to  ask  of  Him  the  question  of  questions  ? 
Come  with  the  eager,  rich,  young  ruler  now ;  you  shall 
ask  it  of  Him  for  yourselves  ;  yes,  and  you  shall  hear 
His  answer.  But,  when  you  have  heard  it,  will  you 
accept  it  ?   Will  you  obey  it  ?   If  it  be  an  answer  accord- 


148  Keep  the  Commandments." 


ing  to  your  idols,  I  know  you  will  ;  but  how  if  it  be 
against  all  your  idols  ?  Idols  are  things  which  people 
worship.  They  are  often  very  ugly  fetiches.  Churches 
have  plenty  of  them  as  well  as  individuals.  When 
Christ  answers  churches  and  men  according  to  their 
idols — nay,  He  never  does  that ;  but  when  they  have 
succeeded  in  making  His  sayings  express  tlieir  meanings 
and  so  turned  the  words  of  life  into  idol-oracles,  then 
slothful  churches  and  self-deceiving  men  are  full  of 
delight.  But  how  if  Christ's  answer  bid  you  cast  your 
particular  idol — your  favorite  sin,  first  of  all,  your 
treasured  pride,  your  besetting  temptation — and  then 
also  your  pet  delusions ;  your  favorite  falsehoods  ;  your 
"  views  ; "  your  "  school  of  thought " — all  your  fringes 
and  phylacteries  ;  your  idols,  the  thin,  fleeting,  shadowy 
delusions  of  your  heart — how  if  Christ's  answer  bid  you 
fling  these  to  the  moles  and  to  the  bats  ?  Will  you  do 
it  then,  or,  as  was  the  case  with  the  young  ruler,  will 
your  countenance  fall,  and  for  all  your  longing  to  go 
to  Christ,  will  you  turn  away  from  Him,  very  sorrow- 
ful, because,  in  these  your  numerous  idols  of  sin,  or  of 
opinion,  or  of  self-righteousness,  you  fancy  that  you 
have  great  possessions  ?  Great  possessions  ?  nay,  these 
are  but  tinsel  and  dross,  and  fairy  gold  which  turns 
to  leaves ;  but  Christ's  answer  will  enable  you  to  win 
that  life  in  Him,  that  eternal  life  which  is  more  golden 
than  any  gold  of  which  yon  dream. 

Well,  at  any  rate  come  to  Christ,  and  hear  His  answer. 

"What  good  thing  must  I  do  that  I  may  inherit 
eternal  life  ?  "  Very  likely  the  question  involved  a  mass 
of  confusions.  The  young  man  thought,  perhaps,  that 
heaven  was  to  be  won  by  external  observances,  and  quanti- 


"Keep  the  Commandments."  149 

tative  merit.  He  did  not  understand  that  we  must 
enter  into  heaven  by  leing,  not  by  doing.  He  held 
perhaps  the  vulgar  notion  that  eternal  only  means  "end- 
less," so  that  eternity  becomes  the  infinitude  of  time 
instead  of  its  antithesis.  He  very  likely  did  not  know 
that  every  holy  soul  has  entered  already  into  eternal  life  ; 
that,  to  all  who  are  in  Christ,  it  is  now  as  the  invisible 
bright  air  they  breathe.  He  certainly  did  not  realize 
that  "  This  is  life  eternal:  to  know  Thee,  the  only  God, 
and  Jesus  Christ  whom  Thou  hast  sent."  But  yet,  be- 
cause the  question  was  sincere  and  noble,  and  did  not 
spring  from  Pharisaism — the  one  thing  which  Christ  the 
Lord  hated  most — but  from  the  divine  dissatisfaction  of 
a  struggling  soul,  which  God  alone  can  fill,  Christ  an- 
swered it.  It  is  a  question  which  no  man  shall  ask  with 
all  his  heart  without  being  led,  sooner  or  later,  to  under- 
stand the  answer. 

"Why  dost  thou  ask  Me  about  the  good  ?  "  That  seems 
to  have  been  our  Lord's  answer  :  not  "  Why  askest  thou 
Me  9  "  as  it  is  often  read — for  whom  else  should  the  young 
man  ask  ? — but  "why  dost  thou  ask  Me  about  the  good  ?  " 
Has  God  left  you  in  any  doubt  as  to  what  is  good  ? 
Have  you  in  your  hearts  no  voice  of  conscience  ?  Has 
duty  never  uplifted  within  you  that  naked  law  of  right, 
so  imperial  in  its  majesty,  so  eternal  in  its  origin,  which 
you  know  that  you  ought  to  follow  even  to  death  ?  If 
not,  and  if  Experience  has  had  no  lessons  for  you,  and 
History  no  teaching,  was  there  no  Sinai  ?  Do  not  the 
Cherubim  of  your  temple  veil  with  their  golden  wings 
the  tablets— alas  !  the  shattered  tablets— of  your  moral 
law  ?  And  there  Jesus  might  have  stopped.  But  being 
unlike  us,  being  infinitely  patient  with  man's  irritating 


150  Keep  the  Commandments." 


spiritual  stupidity,  not  loving,  as  we  do,  to  be  cautious 
and  reticent,  and  "  to  steer  through  the  channel  of  no 
meaning  between  the  Scylla  and  Charybdis  of  yes  and 
no,"  He  added  :  "  But,  if  thou,  wouldst  enter  into  life, 
keep  the  commandments." 

Well,  my  friends,  you  have  come  to  Christ ;  you  have 
asked  Him  the  momentous  question,  about  which  you 
expressed  yourself  so  passionately  in  earnest ;  and  there, 
"with  perfect  explicitness,  transparent,  unambiguous, 
from  Christ's  own  lips,  you  have  Christ's  own  answer: 
"But,  if  thou  wouldst  enter  into  life,  keep  the  command- 
ments." 

The  commandments  !  The  young  ruler,  not  being  as 
familiar  as  we  are  with  the  accumulated  cobwebs  of  two 
thousand  years,  which  churches,  and  sects,  and  theorists, 
and  system-mongers,  have  spun  over  well-nigh  every 
simple  word  of  Christ  ;  the  young  ruler,  whose  natural 
instincts  were  not  crushed  under  hundreds  of  ponderous 
folios  of  human  doctrines  and  commandments  of  men, 
which,  with  inconceivable  aiTogance  and  a  bitterness 
which  has  become  universally  proverbial,  would  fain 
palm  themselves  off  as  infallible  theology — the  young 
ruler,  hearing  the  answer  from  the  lips  of  Jesus,  in  all  its 
bare,  naked,  unqualified,  unmistakable  simplicity,  was 
quite  frankly  amazed.  He  was  like  the  child  Charoba  in 
the  poem,  who  having  been  talked  to  about  the  majestic 
glory  of  the  sea,  and  being  led  to  the  shore,  innocently 
exclaims  :  "Is  that  the  mighty  ocean  ?  Is  that  all  ?" 
"  Keep  the  commandments  !  "  Is  that  all  that  Jesus  has 
to  tell  him  ?  Surely  there  must  be  some  mistake  ? 
It  did  not  need  a  prophet  to  tell  us  that.  This  youth 
had  gone  to  Christ  seeking  for  some  great  thing  to  do,  or 


"Keep  the  Commandments"  151 


secret  thing  to  know.  The  great  Teacher  could  not 
surely  mean  anything  so  commonplace,  so  elementary,  so 
extremely  ordinary,  as  those  old  Ten  Words  which  he 
had  learned  to  lisp,  ever  so  many  years  ago,  when  he 
was  a  little  child  at  his  mother's  knee  ? 

Yes,  but  Christ  did  mean  this,  and  made  His  meaning 
still  more  unmistakable  :  "  But,  if  thou  wouldst  enter 
into  life,  keep  the  commandments."  He  saith  unto  Him, 
"Which  ?"  Jesus  saith  unto  him,  "Thou  shalt  not 
kill.  Thou  shalt  not  commit  adultery.  Thou  shalt  not 
steal.  Thou  shalt  not  bear  false  witness.  Thou  shalt 
not  covet ; "  and  that  all-embracing,  universally- violated 
Eleventh  Commandment,  "Thou  shalt  love  thy  neigh- 
bor as  thyself."  He  does  not  even  remind  him  of  the 
first  table,  but  only  of  these  most  elementary  of  all  laws 
— laws  which  we  might  write  on  the  palms  of  our  hands, 
and  which,  in  spite  of  all  our  high-flown  theology,  we  all 
daily  violate — the  law  of  kindness  ;  the  law  of  purity  ; 
the  law  of  honesty  ;  the  law  of  truth  ;  the  law  of  con- 
tentment; the  law  of  love. 

Well,  if  that  was  really  all  that  Christ  had  to  say  to 
him,  the  young  ruler  did  not  care  to  conceal  his  disap- 
pointment. And  he  said  unto  Him,  "  All  these  have  I 
kept  from  my  youth."  Had  he  indeed  ?  Poor  young 
Pharisee  !  But  after  all  he  was  probably  better  by  far  than 
most  of  us.  At  least  he  had  tried  to  keep  these  command- 
ments, as  he  understood  them,  in  the  letter  ;  at  least  he 
thought  that  he  had  done  so.  He  was  not  a  vulgar  profli- 
gate ;  he  was  not  a  disbelieving  Epicurean  ;  he  was  not  a 
sham  religionist ;  he  was  not  a  conventional  worldling ; 
he  had  not  solved  the  easy  and  fashionable  problem  of  fac- 
ing both  ways  ;  the  white  embers  of  a  life  of  compromise 


152        ''Keep  the  Commandments." 

had  not  settled  thick  upon  his  soul.  And  therefore, 
Jesus,  as  He  looked  on  him,  loved  him  ;  and  loving  him. 
He  made  the  youth's  conscience  luminous  by  flashing  into 
it  one  supreme  and  simple  test  of  sincerity.  Poor  youth, 
dear  youth,  the  simple  commandments  of  God  are  not 
enough  for  thee ;  thou  aimest  at  something  more  high 
and  heroical  in  religion  than  this  age  afiecteth.  "  But " — 
and  may  we  not  imagine  the  tender,  loving  human  smile 
with  which  Jesus  said  it  ? — the  sad,  pitying  smile  of  an 
irony  that  taught  but  did  not  wound — "But  one  thing 
thou  lackest.  Go,  and  sell  all  thou  hast,  and  give  to  the 
poor  ;  and  come,  follow  me."  When  the  young  man 
heard  that,  he  became  gloomy ;  and  he  went  away 
sorrowful,  for  he  had  great  possessions.  He  got  what 
he  had  asked  for,  but  he  did  not  want  it.  It  troubled 
his  conscience,  it  did  not  sway  his  will.  With  slow,  re- 
luctant steps,  and  bent  head,  he  went  away.  He  went 
away,  and  the  eye  of  the  stern  Poet  followed  him  as 
one  who  had  made  "the  great  refusal,"  and  saw  him 
among  the  myriads  hateful  alike  to  God  and  to  His  ene- 
mies ;  who,  being  neither  one  thing  nor  the  other,  are 
whirled  round  and  round  the  outer  edge  of  the  abyss, 
following  the  sooty  flag  of  Acheron.  But  not  so  !  I  will 
not  believe,  with  Dante,  that  Christ  did  not  save  the 
youth  whom,  looking  on.  He  loved.  He  went  away,  we 
may  be  sure,  to  learn,  in  his  sorrowing  and  humbled 
heart,  that  he  had  not  kept  the  commandments  ;  that  he 
had  never  even  understood  the  commandments  in  their 
essential  spirit ;  that  he  was  very  far  from  perfect ;  that 
he  lacked  not  one  thing,  but  very  many  things ;  that 
never  having  truly  loved  his  brother  whom  he  had  seen, 
he  had  not  in  the  least  learnt  to  love,  with  all  his  heart 


Keep  the  Commandments."  153 


and  all  his  strength,  the  God  whom  he  had  not  seen. 
He  went  away,  we  trust  and  believe,  to  learn  all  this, 
and  to  enter  at  last  into  the  joy  of  his  Lord. 

Now  I  have  no  time  to  consider  this  morning  the  ulti- 
mate test  which  Jesus  gave  to  the  young  ruler  who 
wanted,  like  the  rest  of  us,  to  serve  two  masters — God  and 
Mammon.  If  that  were  my  subject,  I  might  show  how 
many  have  taken  it  quite  literally  in  all  ages,  and,  so  tak- 
ing it,  have  received,  not  the  hundred  but  the  thousand- 
fold reward,  and  have  been  infinitely  blessed.  The  Apos- 
tles accepted  that  test,  and  St.  Antony  and  St.  Benedict, 
and  the  greatest  saints  of  God — Christ's  glorious  pau- 
pers— and  they  have  shown  a  sovereign  command  over 
self,  a  supreme  indifference  to  fame,  a  supreme  con- 
tempt for  money,  a  supreme  contempt  for  death.  Who 
cares — I  mean,  what  does  mankind  care — for  average 
Epicureans  like  most  of  us  ?  Who  cares  for  the  chat- 
terers, and  slanderers,  and  mammon-worshippers,  and 
self-indulgent  Sadducees,  of  whom  the  world  is  full  ? 
Who  cares  for  the  gilded  youth,  and  commonplace 
ecclesiastics,  and  self-seeking  statesmen,  and  the  whole 
army  of  facing-both-ways,  and  churchmen  with  every 
vice  of  worldlings,  and  worldlings  with  the  thin  veneer 
of  religion  ?  Ah  !  but  when  a  man  is  a  man,  the  whole 
world  knows  how  to  recognize  him ;  and  when  a  mod- 
ern man,  be  he  the  humblest  of  laymen,  escapes  the 
vulgar  average  of  conventional  compromise  and  becomes 
a  saint,  the  whole  hierarchy  may  be  proud  to  stand 
bareheaded  in  his  presence.  But  do  not  be  afraid. 
Neither  to  you  nor  to  myself  am  I  going  to  offer 
Christ's  test  to-day.  We  may  spare  ourselves  this  morn- 
ing the  task  of  explaining  away,  at  which  we  are  all 


154        ''Keep  the  Commandments^ 


such  adepts.  Christ  did  not  begin  with  the  injunc- 
tion, "Go,  sell  all  that  thou  hast."  He  began  very 
much  lower;  He  said,  "If  thou  wilt  enter  into  life,  keep 
the  commandments."  Let  us  learn  to  flutter  as  sparrows 
before  it  is  worth  considering  whether  we  ought  also  to 
soar  as  eagles.  Let  us  cease  to  be  very  guilty  before  we 
can  be  righteous.  Let  us  be  righteous  before  we  can  at- 
tain to  the  greatness  of  good  men.  Let  us  be  but  ordi- 
narily good  men  before  we  ask  Christ  for  His  counsels  of 
perfection,  or  attempt  to  attain  to  the  stature  of  His 
saints.  Chi'ist  knew  this  well.  We  come  to  Him — 
those  of  us  who  are  sincere  in  this  churcli  this  morning, 
if  any  one  of  you  is  sincere — and  say,  "  Saviour,  whom  I 
love,  whom  at  least  I  desire  to  love,  tell  me,  oh  tell  me, 
what  must  I  do  to  inherit  eternal  life  ?  "  And  so  long 
as  we  are  all  standing  ankle-deep,  knee-deep,  chin-deep 
in  the  world's  mire,  would  it  be  of  any  use  for  Him  to 
point  to  some  shining  cloud  in  the  deep  blue,  and  to  say, 
"You  must  stand  there  ?"  Ah,  no  !  He  says  to  you, 
"  If  thou  wilt  enter  into  life,  keep  the  commandments." 
Until  you  have  learnt  to  plant  firm  feet  on  the  green 
lower  slopes,  how  can  you  breathe  the  difficult  and  eager 
air,  or  stand  in  the  glory  of  the  sunrise,  on  the  splendor 
of  the  snowy  heights  ? 

Let  me  pause  again,  one  moment,  to  ask  each  one  of 
you  why  you  are  here  this  morning.  Have  some  of  you 
come  out  of  curiosity,  in  order  that  afterwards  you  may 
laugh  your  laugh,  and  say  your  little  say  ?  Have  some 
of  you  only  come  that  light  remarks,  clever  jests,  frivo- 
lous criticisms,  may  instantly  devour  any  chance  good 
seed  which  might  otherwise  have  conceivably  germi- 
nated in  some  spot  where  the  beaten  road  of  your  heart 


''Keep  the  Commandments."  155 

is  trodden  least  hard  ?  Ah,  my  friends,  if  so,  you  will 
hear  nothing  from  me  to  gratify  the  itching  ear;  noth- 
ing but  the  plainest  truths  of  God  in  the  simplest  lan- 
guage of  men.  The  foolishness  of  preaching  ?  Ah, 
yes  !  but  may  there  not  be  a  yet  more  conspicuous,  a 
yet  more  consummate  foolishness  of  hearing — the  hear- 
ing of  the  cynic,  the  hearing  of  the  Pharisee,  the  hear- 
ing of  the  partisan  ?  How  you  hear  matters  nothing  to 
the  preacher.  To  him — to  every  preacher  who  would  be 
true  to  his  office,  to  every  preacher  who  would 

"  Preach  as  one  who  ne'er  should  preach  again, 
And  as  a  dying  man  to  dying  men," 

the  praise  or  the  censure  of  congregations  and  of  news- 
papers have  long  become  of  no  more  value  than  dust  in 
the  midnight.  But  how  ye  hear  matters  much  to  you. 
Take  heed  how  ye  hear !  Have  any  of  you,  by  any  chance, 
come  with  the  rare  endowment  of  a  humble  heart,  the  heart 
as  of  a  weaned  child,  desiring  only  to  get  some  good  for 
your  lives  ?  Ah,  then,  if  you  have  learned  the  truth, 
that — be  you  "  churchman  "  or  "  theologian,"  or  man  of 
intellect,  or  man  of  the  world,  or  whatever  you  be — you 
can  only  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven  as  a  little 
child,  then  alone  can  this  sermon,  or  any  other,  do  you 
any  good. 

And  I  say  that  to  most  of  you,  at  present,  to  all  per- 
haps, but  one  or  two  here,  Christ  says,  not,  "  Sell  all 
that  thou  hast,"  but  He  says  only,  "  If  thou  wilt  enter 
into  life,  keep  the  commandments."  You  cannot  keep 
them  perfectly.  When  you  have  done  your  little  best 
to  keep  them,  that  alone  will  not  save  you.  You  will 
never  be  able  to  put  your  trust  in  anything  that  you  do. 


I 


156        "Keep  the  Commandments" 

Eternal  life  is  neither  "  isolated  truth  nor  orphaned 
deed,"  but  it  is  "  to  know  God  ;"  and  you  cannot  ever 
know  God  but  by  repentance  and  by  faith  ;  nor  can 
any  other  angels  but  those  two  lead  you  to  Jesus  Christ, 
whom  God  hath  sent.  Nevertheless,  if  you  have  one 
touch  of  repentance — if  you  have  one  gleam  of  faith — 
both  will  make  you  see  that  "to  keep  the  command- 
ments" is  to  put  your  foot  on  the  lowest  round  of  that 
golden  stair  which  leads  to  God.  "  If  thou  wouldst 
enter  into  life,  keep  the  commandments."  My  friends, 
have  you  begun  with  that  ?  Have  you  begun  to  begin 
with  that  ?  "  Sell  all  that  thou  hast  ?"  No,  not  yet ! 
To  you  who  are  still  young — if  you  be  true  to  your- 
selves, if  you  escape  the  corruption  which  is  in  the 
world  through  lust,  if  you  shake  off  the  quotidian  ague 
of  its  conventionality  and  the  creeping  paralysis  of  its 
unbelief — to  you  even  that  message  may  yet  peal  forth 
in  thunder  louder  than  of  Sinai ;  and  gladly  welcom- 
ing it  with  pride,  not  seeking  to  minimize  and  evac- 
uate it  of  its  meaning — gladly  you  will  spring  to  the 
front  to  obey  it.  Some  day.  Perhaps  very  soon.  But 
not  yet.  What  then  ?  Give  a  tenth,  a  twentieth,  an 
hundredth  part  of  your  possessions  ?  Not  yet — but 
first,  "  Let  the  wicked  forsake  his  way  and  the  un- 
righteous man  his  thoughts."  "  Wash  you  ;  make  you 
clean ;  put  away  the  evil  of  your  doings  from  before 
Mine  eyes. "  Do  you  think  that  it  is  of  any  use  to  call 
yourself  a  Christian,  and  not  to  be  a  Christian  ?  to  say, 
"I  go,  sir,"  and  not  to  go  ?  Do  you  think  that  at  the 
solemn  bar  of  judgment  you  will  be  examined  about 
your  "  party,"  or  your  "  opinion  ?"  Do  you  think  that 
your  Father  in  heaven  cares  anything  whatever  about 


Keep  the  Commandments."  157 


your  moral  and  religious  speculations  ;  your  pet  shibbo- 
leth ;  or  your  favorite  form  of  ritual  ;  or  your  partic- 
ular theory  about  the  sacrament  ?  Do  you  think  that 
if  you  are  base  and  unclean,  and  false  and  envious,  and 
saturated  with  unfair  prejudices — do  you  think  it  will 
help  you  one  iota  to  say,  "  Lord,  Lord  ?  "  If  you  do, 
oh,  tell  me  not  that  you  believe  in  Christ.  For  what 
Christ  said  was,  "  If  ye  love  me,  keep  my  command- 
ments." "  If  thou  wouldst  enter  into  life,  keep  the  com- 
mandments." "Why  call  ye  me.  Lord,  Lord,  and  do  not 
the  things  that  I  say  ?  "  "  He  that  heareth  my  words 
and  doeth  them  not,  is  like  a  man  that  built  his  house 
upon  the  sands."  Perhaps  you  call  this  justification  by 
works.  To  whom  then  do  you  apply  your  party  watch- 
word ?  For  I  have  been  quoting  only  the  words  of 
Christ ;  I  have  only  to  do  with  what  Christ  taught.  And 
what  Christ  taught  was  what  Moses  taught,  "And  now, 
Israel,  what  doth  the  Lord  thy  God  require  of  Thee  but 
to  walk  in  His  ways  ?"  and  what  Samuel  taught,  "Be- 
hold obedience  is  better  than  sacrifice;"  and  what 
David  taught,  "  Keep  innocency,  and  do  the  thing  that 
is  right ;  for  that  shall  bring  a  man  peace  at  the  last ;  " 
and  what  Hosea  taught,  "  I  will  have  mercy,  and 
not  sacrifice;"  and  what  Jeremiah  taught,  "I  spake 
not  unto  your  fathers  concerning  burnt-olferings,  but 
this  I  commanded  them,  Obey  my  voice  ; "  and  what 
Amos  taught,  "I  hate,  I  despise  your  feast  days,  but 
let  judgment  run  down  as  waters,  and  rigliteousness 
as  a  mighty  stream  ;  "  and  what  Isaiah  taught,  "  Bring 
no  more  oblations,  cease  to  do  evil,  learn  to  do  well ; " 
and  what  John  the  Baptist  taught,  "  Bring  forth  fruits 
meet  for  repentance ; "  and  what  Micah  taught,  "  He 


158        ''Keep  the  Commandments'' 


hath  shown  thee,  oh  man,  what  is  good,  and  what  doth 
the  Lord  require  of  thee,  but  to  do  justice,  and  to  love 
mercy,  and  to  walk  humbly  with  thy  God  ; "  and  what 
John  the  Evangelist  taught,  "  Blessed  are  all  they  tliat 
do  His  commandments  ;"  and  what  James,  the  Lord's 
brother,  taught,  "  Be  ye  doers  of  the  word  and  not  hear- 
ers, only  deceiving  your  own  selves."  What  others  have 
taught  I  know  not,  nor  greatly  care  ;  but  what  God's 
prophets  have  taught,  and  what  He  taught  of  whom  all 
the  prophets  witness,  that  I  know.  One  good  deed, 
one  holy  deed,  one  noble,  generous,  self-denying,  loving 
deed,  if  ever  you  can  prove  yourself  capable  of  it,  will 
be  enough  to  clear  your  minds  from  the  cobwebs  and 
delusions  of  an  accumalated  self-deceit.  For  of  all  the 
sixty-six  books  of  the  Bible  which  you  search  because 
ye  think  that  in  them  ye  have  eternal  life,  while  you 
will  not  come  unto  Christ  that  ye  may  have  life,  there 
is  not  one  which  tells  you  that  either  your  opinions  or 
your  outward  observances  will  save  you;  but  they  all  say, 
as  your  Lord  said,  this,  "  Whatsoever  ye  would  that  men 
should  do  unto  you,  even  so  do  unto  them,  for  this  is 
the  Law  and  the  Prophets  ;"  and  this,  "But  if  thou 
wilt  enter  into  life,  keep  the  commandments." 

Ah,  my  friends,  it  is  faith  alone  which  can  save  us ; 
faith  alone  in  God,  in  Christ,  in  the  Holy  Spirit,  by  which 
we  can  be  enabled  to  do  those  things  which  are  good.  But 
we  may  talk  of  our  faith  till  the  world's  end,  and,  if  our 
faith  do  not  mean  obedience,  we  talk  delusion.  There 
is  no  way  of  entering  on  the  path  of  salvation  but  one, 
and  that  is  by  forsaking  sin.  Christ  did  not  die  that  we 
should  continue  to  be  drunkards,  or  cheats,  or  liars,  or 
unclean ;  or,  which  is  just  as  bad,  slanderers,  and  de- 


"Keep  the  Commandments."  159 


frauders,  and  mammon-worshippers,  and  Pharisees.  Ah, 
no  !  He  died  that  we  might  become  His  children.  And 
all  good  men  are  His  children.  All  good  men,  I  say, 
are  His  children.  Take  the  Roman  Catholic  with  his 
seven  sacraments,  the  Quaker  with  his  no  sacraments  at 
all,  the  Anglican  with  his  episcopacy,  and  the  Baptist 
with  his  elders,  the  Low  Churchman  with  his  distinctive 
formulae,  and  the  High  Churchman  with  his  Real  Pres- 
ence— if  they  do  God's  will.  He  Himself  has  promised 
that  they  shall  know  of  the  doctrine,  know  of  it  enough 
for  the  saving  of  their  souls.  Are  they  sincere  and  holy 
men  ?  Well,  then,  I  say  in  Christ's  name,  who  forgives 
the  feeble  ignorances  of  our  opinions  about  which  we  all 
differ,  but  who  shed  His  blood  to  save  our  human  souls, 
in  His  name  I  say  that,  "  Not  every  one  who  saith  unto 
me  Lord,  Lord,  shall  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven," 
but  he — whether  or  not  he  follow  after  us — he  who  do- 
eth  the  will  of  my  Father  in  heaven. 

If  thou  wouldst  enter  into  life,  keep  the  command- 
ments. The  heresy  of  all  heresies  of  which  churches 
have  been  guilty  has  been  the  exaltation  of  religious 
opinions  and  religious  practices  into  higher  prominence 
than  moral  purity.  But  beliefs  unexceptionally  ortho- 
dox are  compatible  with  the  life  of  devils,  who  believe 
and  tremble  ;  and  rituals  consummately  precise  may  be 
performed  by  priests  who 

"  Have  turned  atheists,  as  did  Eli's  sons,  who  filled 
With  lust  and  violence  the  house  of  God." 

Ah,  if  any  of  you  value  yourselves  for  your  opinions 
and  your  ceremonies,  cease  to  trust  in  that  Pharisaism, 
and  try,  rather,  to  keep  the  commandments.    Did  you 


i6o  Keep  the  Commandments.^^ 


ever  hear  the  keen  mediseval  story  how  once  a  great 
preacher  was  expected  at  a  monastic  church,  but  a 
stranger  came  in  his  place  and  preached  a  most  eloquent 
sermon  about  all  sorts  of  theological  dogmas,  and  while 
all  the  rest  listened  and  loudly  applauded,  the  pure  eye 
of  one  holy  brother  saw  that  the  preacher  was  no  other 
than  the  Lord  of  Hell,  the  Frater  Diabolus;  and  when 
with  horror  he  challenged  him  for  his  infamous  audacity, 
the  Spirit  of  Evil  said  to  him,  "  Why  are  you  so  angry  ? 
I  have  in  nowise  injured  my  own  cause.  What  I  have 
said  will  make  no  one  of  them  the  better,  rather  the 
worse.  It  has  pleased  their  orthodox  intellects.  It  has 
not  touched  their  sinful  hearts.  Ask  yourselves  hon- 
estly," said  Satan,  "  whether  I  have  ever  deceived  any 
one  of  you  ?  You  have  deceived  yourselves.  I  do  not 
deceive.    I  tempt." 

And  to  keep  the  commandments,  what  is  it  but  to  re- 
sist temptation,  to  cut  off  the  right  hand,  to  pluck  out 
the  right  eye,  to  cast  away  the  besetting  sin  ?  If  you 
would  so  much  as  enter  into  life,  test  yourself  by  what  you 
have  now  heard.  There  can  be  no  mistake  about  it.  A 
child  might  understand  it.  Have  you  an  enemy  ?  Then 
this  very  day  seek  him  out,  shake  hands  with  him  ;  for- 
give him.  Have  you  wronged  another  by  word  or  by  deed  ? 
Undo  the  wrong,  repair  the  wrong,  beg  his  pardon,  make 
him  the  fullest,  the  amplest  retribution.  Are  you  a  slan- 
derer, delighting  in  lies  ?  a  critic  revelling  in  malice  and  in 
misrepresentation  ?  Hush  your  vain  words ;  be  ashamed 
of  your  miserable  personalities  ;  learn  how  much  nobler 
a  thing  it  is  to  be  true  and  loving  ;  fling  your  wretched 
pen  into  the  fire  and  grasp  the  fact  that  you  would  be  a 
far  worthier,  a  far  less  pernicious  member  of  society,  if 


"Keep  the  Commandments ^  i<3i 


you  were  to  earn  your  bread  in  preference  by  breaking 
stones  upon  the  roadside.  Are  you  in  debt  ?  Vow  to 
rid  yourself  of  that  dishonesty  now  and  forever,  if  neces- 
sary by  living  even  on  bread  and  water.  Are  yo^^  idle  ? 
Go  home  and  determine  that  you  will  waste  no  more 
this  acceptable  time  of  golden  opportunities.  Are  you  a 
swearer  ?  Determine  on  your  knees  to-night  that  you 
will  break  off  that  coarse  and  pre-eminently  senseless 
habit.  Are  you  a  better  and  a  gambler  ?  Go  home  and 
tear  up  your  cards  and  your  betting-book,  and  abandon, 
that  bramless  and  degrading  excitement.  Are  you  a 
drunkard  or  getting  fond  of  drink,  and  so  being  dragged, 
perhaps  even  unsuspected  by  yourself,  over  the  edge  of 
the  abyss  by  that  devil's  hand  of  flame  ?  Then  do  right 
and  shame  the  devil.  Give  up  the  drink.  Are  you  liv- 
ing two  lives  ?  Do  not  rest  this  nigbt  until  you  have 
learned  to  know  something  about  your  real  self.  Are 
you  impure  in  thought,  word,  or  deed, 

"plucking  the  rose 
From  the  fair  forehead  of  an  innocent  shane, 
To  set  a  blister  there  ?  " 

Ah  !  cleanse  the  temple-walls  of  your  souls  from  that 
polluted  imagery,  and  come  with  that  leprosy  of  evil  to 
Him,  whose  answer  to  the  leper's  cry,  "Lord,  if  thou 
wilt,  thou  canst  cleanse,"  came  like  an  echo,  "I  will! 
Be  clean  !"  Or  are  you  none  of  these  things,  but  only 
an  elder  brother  of  the  Prodigal,  jealous  and  narrow- 
hearted — only  a  Pharisee,  wise  in  your  conceit,  slander- 
ing and  sneering  at  all  who  disagree  with  you,  trusting 
in  yourself  that  you  are  righteous,  and  despising  others  ? 
Ah,  if  you  are,  it  may  be  that  the  very  publicans  and 
11 


1 62  Keep  the  Commandments." 

harlots  are  nearer  heaven  than  you  ;  and  you  must  yet 
be  taught  to  know  that  without  love,  and  without 
humility,  ye  shall  not  see  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  Oh, 
hide  not  your  disbelief,  and  hide  not  any  evil  way  in 
the  garb  of  idle  form  and  sanctified  phraseology,  nor 
think  that  by  calling  yourself  by  this  and  that  religious 
name  you  can  be  His  disciple.  Ah  !  have  you  ever 
abandoned  one  base  thought,  one  bad  habit,  one  unfair 
practice,  one  unkind  word,  one  unjust  gain,  because 
Christ  bade  you  ?  Have  you  ever  uttered  one  brave  re- 
monstrance for  Christ's  sake  ?  Have  you  ever  done  one 
single  courageous  thing  in  His  battles  ?  Have  you  ever 
given  so  much  as  one  cup  of  cold  water  to  one  of  His 
little  ones  ?  Have  you  ever  spoken  one  kind  word  of 
encouragement  to  one  of  His  weary  children  for  His 
sake  and  in  His  name  ?  If  not,  do  so  now.  Christ 
"wants  you  not  in  church  only,  not  on  Sundays  only, 
but  always  and  altogether  ;  in  your  shop,  in  your  office, 
in  your  drawing-rooms,  on  the  week  days,  in  the  streets, 
in  your  chambers — alike  when  you  are  mingling  with 
the  mighty  multitude,  and  in  that  secret  and  awful 
solitude  of  your  individual  being  in  which  your  souls 
are  alone  with  God.  He  wants  you,  and  if  you  seek 
Him,  you  must  accept  His  words.  You  must  go  up 
before  the  tribunal  of  your  own  consciences,  and  set 
yourselves  before  yourselves.  Try  your  own  selves : — 
for  in  truth  every  man 

"  Ever  bears  about 
A  silent  coiu't  of  justice  in  himself, 
Himself  the  judge  and  jury,  and  himself 
The  prisoner  at  the  bar,  ever  condemned, 
And  that  drags  down  his  life." 


"Keep  the  Commandments ^  163 

You  must  begin  sometime  ;  you  must  begin  with 
something.  "A  good  habit  can  only  be  built  up;  but 
an  evil  habit  must  be  blown  up  ; "  and  to  do  you  that 
service,  what  moral  dynamite  can  be  too  strong  ?  So 
only  can  you  ever  enter  into  life.  Begin  now ;  begin 
here  ;  begin  this  very  hour ;  make  your  vow  this  very 
moment,  in  this  very  church.  So  begin  to  enter  into 
life.  "  For  by  this  we  know  that  we  love  the  children 
of  God,  when  we  love  God,  and  keep  His  command- 
ments." "And  His  commandments  are  not  grievous. " 
"  But  if  thou  wilt  enter  into  life,  keep  the  command- 
ments." 


SERMON  XI. 


Peeached  in  Tbinitt  Chukch,  New  Yoek,  Oct.  25,  1885. 


Little  children,  keep  yourselves  from  idols." — 1  John  v.  21. 

With  tliese  terse  and  memorable  words  of  warning, 
St.  John  ends  his  first  Epistle,  You  will  feel,  I  think, 
at  once  the  solemnity  of  their  emphasis.  But  they 
acquire  a  still  deeper  interest,  and  a  still  more  intense 
significance  if  St.  John's  first  Epistle  be,  as  it  probably 
was,  the  latest  book  of  the  New  Testament ;  if  in  these 
words  we  hear  the  very  last  accents  of  revelation  which 
issued  from  the  lips  of  any  one  of  those  who  had  known 
the  Lord,  and  whose  brows  had  been  mitred  with  Pen- 
tecostal flame.  St.  John  was  the  last  survivor  of  the 
Apostles.  Ought  not  the  last  words  of  an  Apostle,  of 
the  Apostle  whom  Jesus  loved,  to  be  listened  to  with  an 
eagerness  deep  as  that  with  which  we  listen  to  the  last 
articulate  messages  spoken  by  the  dying  lips  of  those 
whom  we  revere  ? 

St.  John  calls  his  converts  little  childi'en,  not  only  as 
a  term  of  affectionate  appeal,  natural  to  an  inspired 
teacher  who  could  look  upon  them  from  the  snowy 


Idols. 


summits  of  ninety  years,  but  also  because  he  wished 
ever  to  remind  them  of  that  great  family  of  God  in 
which  we  all  are  children ;  and  of  that  Heavenly 
Father,  the  sense  of  whose  loving  fatherhood  should 
ever  be  the  strongest  preservative  from  temptations  to 
idolatry.  And  St.  John  says  :  "  My  little  children, 
guard  yourselves  from  idols,"  because  nothing  but  their 
own  watchful  faith  and  love  could  keep  them  from  that 
tendency  to  idolatry  to  which  they  were  prone,  from 
those  temptations  to  idolatry  by  which  they  were  on 
every  side  beset. 

The  whole  history  of  the  Jews,  of  which  the  Bible 
is  the  record,  is  one  long  warning  and  protest  against 
idolatry,  Abraham  became  the  father  of  the  faithful 
because  he  obeyed  the  call  of  God  to  abandon  the  idols 
which  his  fathers  had  worshipped  beyond  the  Euphrates. 
Jacob  made  his  family  bury  under  the  Terebinth  of 
Shechem  their  Syrian  amulets  and  Sjrrian  gods.  But 
Israel  was  constantly  starting  aside  into  idolatry  like 
a  broken  bow.  Even  in  the  wilderness  they  took  up 
the  tabernacle  of  Moloch,  and  the  star  of  their  god, 
Remphan,  idols  which  they  had  made  to  worship.  Even 
under  the  burning  crags  of  Sinai,  "they  made  a  calf  in 
Horeb,  and  worshipped  the  graven  image;"  and  for 
centuries  afterwards  the  apostate  kings  of  northern 
Israel  doubled  that  sin  in  Dan  and  Bethel. 

The  seven  servitudes  of  the  Book  of  Judges  were 
the  appropriate  retribution  for  seven  apostasies.  From 
Solomon  to  Manasseh,  king  after  king,  even  of  Judah, 
forsook  the  Lord  Jehovah.  Then  came  the  crushing 
blow  of  the  Exile,  the  utter  ruin  of  every  hope  of  domi- 
nation or  of  independence.    The  agony  of  being  thus 


Idols. 


torn  from  their  temple,  and  their  home,  and  the  land 
they  loved,  cured  them  forever  of  material  idolatry ; 
but  alas  !  they  fell  headlong  into  another  and  subtler 
idolatry — the  idolatry  of  forms  and  ceremonies — the 
idolatry  of  the  dead  letter  of  their  law.  Pharisaism  was 
only  a  new  idolatry,  and  it  was,  in  some  respects,  more 
dangerous  than  the  old.  It  was  more  dangerous,  be- 
cause more  self-satisfied,  more  hopelessly  impenitent ; 
more  dangerous  because,  being  idolatry,  it  passed  itself 
off  as  the  perfection  of  faithful  worship.  Hence  it 
plunged  them  into  a  yet  deadlier  iniquity.  Baal  wor- 
shippers had  murdered  the  Prophets  ;  Pharisees  cruci- 
fied the  Lord  of  Life. 

All  Scripture  rings  with  denunciations  against  idola- 
try. Its  histories  are  chiefly  designed  to  show  the  judg- 
ments which  idolatry  evoked.  Its  poetry  and  its  proph- 
esy pursue  idolatry  with  a  burning  storm  of  irony  and 
indignation.  Why  do  we  continue,  weekly  and  yearly, 
these  strong  denunciations,  if  they  have  no  longer  any 
meaning  for  us  ? 

My  friends,  one-half,  at  least,  of  the  Bible  would 
have  only  retained  an  historic  interest  if  idolatry  were 
an  extinct  temptation.  It  is  not  so.  There  is  an  open 
and  a  secret  idolatry.  There  is  an  objective  and  a  sub- 
jective idolatry,  which  still  are  full  of  peril.  Satan  is 
not  likely  to  have  abandoned,  without  a  struggle,  his 
master-weapon  of  a  thousand  years. 

Let  us,  then,  glance  at  three  forms  of  idolatry,  against 
which  we  must  ever  be  on  our  guard. 

First,  there  is  the  worship  of  other  gods,  of  false  gods, 
the  worship  of  Moloch,  and  Baalim,  and  Ashtaroth  ; 
gods  of  gold  and  jewels,  gods  of  lust  and  blood,  into 


Idols. 


167 


which  the  Jews  were  seduced  by  the  fascination  of 
those 

^  "  Gay  religions,  full  of  pomp  and  gold," 

which  flourished  among  their  heathen  neighbors.  This 
is  a  violation  of  the  first  commandment. 

Secondly,  there  is  the  worship  of  the  true  God  under 
false  and  idolatrous  symbols.  Those  who  danced  round 
the  golden  calf  in  the  wilderness,  or  went  astray  after 
Gideon's  gorgeous  ephod,  or  bowed  the  knee  in  the 
royal  chapel  at  Bethel,  did  not  regard  themselves  as 
idolaters.  They  were  only  setting  up  a  visible  symbol 
of  God's  unseen  presence.  Too  gross  for  a  pure  spiritual 
worship,  they  would  yet  have  said,  as  image  worshippers 
have  in  all  ages  pleaded  on  their  own  behalf,  this  calf  is 
no  "  gilded  beast ; "  we  do  not  worship  it ;  it  is  not  a 
mere  "  caK  that  eateth  hay  ; "  it  is  a  cherubic  emblem, 
like  those  woven  on  the  curtains  of  the  Temple  on  Sion, 
or  those  which  stretch  their  wings  over  the  mercy  seat. 
And  yet  calf-worship  was  idolatry.  It  was  a  violation 
of  the  second  commandment. 

The  third  form  of  idolatry  was  the  worship  of  the 
true  God  under  the  guise  of  false  notions,  false  con- 
ditions. The  Priests  and  Pharisees  imagined  God  could 
be  adequately  worshipped  by  accuracy  in  shibboleths 
and  sci-upulosity  in  observances  ;  that  what  He  cared  for 
was  sacrifice,  not  mercy  ;  fasting,  not  charity  ;  ortho- 
doxy, not  incense  ;  instrumentals,  not  fundamentals  ; 
bowing  the  head  like  a  bulrush,  burning  in  the  most 
approved  method  the  two  kidneys  with  the  fat,  not  being 
meek  and  merciful  and  just.  This,  too,  was  a  violation 
of  the  second  commandment ;  for  if  the  first  says,  thou 
shalt  worship  the  true  God  exclusively,  the  second,  as 


Idols. 


Christ  explains  it,  says  thou  shalt  worship  the  true  God 
spiritually.  "God  is  a  spirit,  and  they  that  worship 
Him  must  worship  Him  in  spirit  and  in  truth." 

But  perhaps,  my  brethren,  you  are  asking  already, 
How  does  all  this  concern  us  ?  We  are  not  idolaters. 
We  have  not  the  smallest  temptation  to  idolatry.  Are 
we  to  hear  nothing  but  pulpit  conventionalities,  lessons 
which  have  no  bearing  on  real  life,  warnings  which  are 
purely  obsolete  ?  Ah,  my  brethren,  do  not  be  afraid.  I 
shall  touch  your  consciences  near  enough  before  I  have 
done.  The  temptation  to  idolatry  is  no  mere  archaism. 
It  is  a  very  subtle  thing.  It  lies  at  the  root  of  all 
temptations ;  and  men  are  often  most  in  danger  when 
they  least  suspect  it.  "We  be  Abraham's  seed,  and 
were  never  in  bondage  to  any  man,"  said  the  Jews  to 
Jesus,  at  the  very  time  when  they  were  showing  them- 
selves to  be  least  of  all  Abraham's  true  seed,  and  when 
they  were  in  bondage  of  many  kinds.  "  Are  we  blind 
also  ?"  asked  the  Pharisees  of  Christ,  in  astonished  in- 
credulity, holding  themselves  to  be  the  very  hierophants 
of  all  orthodoxy,  the  very  illuminati  of  consummate 
theology.  "  Ye  say,  '  we  see, ' "  answered  Jesus  ;  "  there- 
fore your  sin  remaineth."  I  do  not  think  that  so  large 
a  part  of  Scripture  would  be  taken  up  with  warnings 
against  idolatry,  if  idolatry  were  an  exploded  peril. 
May  it  not  be  that  some  of  us  are  idolaters  and  know  it 
not? 

Take,  for  instance,  the  first  and  grossest  form  of 
idolatry,  the  worship  of  other  gods.  You  will  say,  "  We 
have  never  worshipped  other  gods ;  we  have  barely  so 
much  as  seen  other  gods,  except  it  were  as  idols  in  a 
museum."  Yes,  but  whence  came,  what  was  the  source 


Idols. 


of  the  strange  temptation  of  the  Israelites  to  break  their 
first  commandment  ?  What  could  possibly  induce  them 
to  turn  from 

"Jehovah,  thundering  out  of  Zion,  throned 
Between  the  Cherubim," 

to  worship  the  lopped  tree-trunk  which  represented  the 
nature-goddess  Asherah  ;  or  the  sea  monster,  upward 
man  and  downward  fish,  who  was  called  Dagon ;  or  a 
hideous  brazen  image,  with  arms  sloping  down  toward  a 
cistern  of  fire,  which  the  Ammonites  called  Milcom, 
"  my  King  ?  "  My  brethren,  the  history  of  the  human 
heart  in  all  ages  shows  that  the  force  of  the  temptation 
is  not  so  very  inconceivable.  The  Jews  were  tempted  to 
worship  these  idols,  because  they  saw  in  the  lives  of  the 
nations  around  them  that  emancipation  from  shame, 
from  conscience,  from  restraint,  from  the  stern  and 
awful  laws  of  morality,  for  which  all  bad  men  sigh. 
They  longed  for  that  slavery  of  sin  which  would  be  free- 
dom from  righteousness.  These  idols  were  the  deifica- 
tion of  man's  worst  impulses;  they  were  the  patrons  of 
his  basest  desires  ;  they  consecrated,  under  the  sanction 
of  religion,  his  deadliest  passions.  It  was  not  the  re- 
volting image  of  Moloch  which  allured  them,  but  it  was 
the  spirit  of  hatred  ;  the  fierce  delight  of  the  natural  wild 
beast  which  lurks  in  the  human  heart.  Moloch  was  but 
the  projection  into  the  outward  of  ghastly  fears  born  of 
man's  own  guilt ;  the  consequent  impulse  to  look  on  God 
as  a  wrathful,  avenging  Being,  only  to  be  propitiated 
by  human  agony  and  human  blood ;  and  as  One  whom 
(so  whispered  to  them  a  terrified  selfishness)  it  was 
better  to  propitiate  by  passing  one's  children  through 


Idols. 


the  fire,  than  oneself  to  suffer  from  His  rage.  Again,  it 
was  not  any  image  of  Mammon  which  allured  them  to 
worship  that  abject  spirit.  It  was  the  love  of  money, 
which  is  a  root  of  all  evil ; — it  was  covetousness,  which 
is  idolatry.  And  why  should  they  worship  the  degraded 
Eaal-Peor  ?  Why  but  because  he  was  degraded  ?  Why 
but  because  of  "those  wanton  rites  which  cost  them 
woe  ?  "  Why  but  because,  under  his  loathly  patronage, 
they  might,  like  natural  brute  beasts  made  to  be  taken 
and  destroyed,  corrupt  themselves  in  those  things  which 
they  naturally  knew.  And  as  for  Belial,  they  did  not 
even  profess  to  raise  him  images.  He  was  only  a  sub- 
jective idol.  Milton,  when,  in  the  magnificent  first 
book  of  his  Paradise  Lost,  he  describes  their  deities, 
says : 

"Belial  came  last,  than  whom  a  spirit  more  lewd 
Fell  not  from  heaven,  nor  one  more  gross  to  love 
Vice  for  itself  ;  to  him  no  temple  stood. 
No  altar  smoked  ;  yet  who  more  oft  than  he 
In  temples  and  at  altars,  where  the  priest 
Turns  Atheist,  as  did  Eli's  sons,  and  fills 
With  lust  and  violence  the  house  of  God  ? 
In  courts  and  palaces  he  also  reierns, 
And  in  luxurious  cities,  where  the  noise 
Of  riot  ascends  above  their  loftiest  towers, 
And  injury  and  outrage  ;  and  when  night 
Darkens  the  streets,  then  wander  forth  the  sons 
Of  Belial  flown  with  insolence  and  wine." 

Ah  !  my  brethren,  have  we  no  need,  in  these  days,  not 
only  for  the  gentle  appeal,  "Little  children,"  but  for 
some  voice  like  the  woe  of  the  Apocalypse  which  would 
thunder  to  us,  "Keep  yourselves  from  idols?"  Do 
none  of  you  worship  Moloch,  or  Mammon,  or  Baal- 


Idols. 


171 


Peor  ?  Have  none  of  you  in  your  hearts  a  secret  niche 
for  Belial  ?  When  your  heart  is  absorbed  in  a  passion 
of  envy,  hatred,  and  rage  ;  when  you  desire,  and  are  de- 
termined, if  you  can,  to  wound  by  false  words,  by  bitter 
attacks,  by  open  or  secret  injuries  ;  when  you  display 
**the  eternal  spirit  of  the  populace  "  by  giving  yourself 
up  to  a  passion  of  reckless  depreciation  of  social,  politi- 
cal, or  religious  opponents  ;  when  you  invoke  the  very 
name  of  God,  that  you  may  emphasize  the  curses  against 
your  enemies,  is  God  the  God  of  your  worship  ?  Of 
your  lips,  yes  !  of  your  life,  no  !  What  are  you,  then, 
whatever  you  may  call  yourself,  what  are  you  but  a 
worshipper  of  Moloch  ? 

And  when  you  talk  of  nothing,  think  of  nothing, 
scheme  after  nothing,  care  for  nothing,  I  had  almost 
said  pray  for  nothing  but  "money,"  "money," 
"  money,"  all  day  long  ;  hasting  to  be  rich,  and  so  not 
being  innocent ;  ready,  if  not  downright  to  forge  or  to 
steal  in  order  to  get  it,  yet  ready  to  adulterate  goods,  to 
scamp  work,  to  have  false  balances  and  unjust  weights, 
to  defraud  others  of  their  rights  and  claims,  to  put  your 
whole  trading,  or  commerce,  or  profession  on  a  foot- 
ing which,  perhaps  conventionally  honest,  yet  goes  to 
the  very  verge  of  dishonesty  ;  toiling  for  money,  valuing 
it  first  among  earthly  goods,  looking  up  to  those  who 
have  won  it  as  though  they  were  little  gods  ;  hoarding 
it,  dwelling  on  it,  measuring  the  sole  success  of  life  by 
it,  marrying  your  sons  and  your  daughters  with  maiu 
reference  to  it — is  God  the  God  of  your  worship  ?  Of 
your  lips,  yes  ;  of  your  life,  no.  What  are  you,  then, 
but  an  idolater — a  worshipper  of  Mammon  ? 

And  if  you  are  a  drunkard  or  impure  ;  if  the  current 


172 


Idols. 


of  your  life  is  absorbed  and  swayed  by  unholy  impulses  ; 
if  you  have  flung  the  reins  upon  the  neck  of  your  evil 
passions  ;  if  your  thoughts  are  incessantly  going  astray 
after  base  desires  ;  if  as  in  the  throb  and  counter-throb 
of  the  beating  heart,  the  corrupted  soul  is  ever  sending 
its  fever  beats  of  diseased  imagination  to  the  polluted 
body,  and  the  polhited  body  returning  the  languid  cur- 
rents of  its  self-indulgence  to  the  corrupted  soul ;  if  you 
are  living  in  constant  and  unresisted  violation  of  God's 
laws  of  temperance,  soberness,  and  chastity  ;  if  the  Tem- 
ple of  your  mortal  body  be  full  of  such  chambers  as 
Ezekiel  saw, 

"  When,  by  the  vision  led 
His  eye  surveyed  the  dark  idolatries 
Of  alienated  Judah — " 

chambers  in  which  wicked  thoughts  are  ever  bending 
before  the  walls  which  glow  with  unhallowed  imagery — 
again  is  God  the  God  of  your  worship  ?  Of  your  lips, 
yes  ;  of  your  life,  no  !  What  are  you  then  but  an  idol- 
ater ?  In  what  respect  are  you,  then,  less  guilty  than 
Zimri,  the  Prince  of  Simeon  who  worshipped  Baal- 
Peor? 

Not  an  idolater  ?  alas  !  my  brethren,  every  one  of  us 
is  an  idolater  who  has  not  God  in  all  his  thoughts,  and 
who  has  cast  away  the  laws  of  God  from  the  govern- 
ance of  his  life.  I  know  not  that  it  is  a  much  worse 
idolatry  to  deny  God  altogether,  and  openly  to  deify  the 
brute  impulses  of  our  lower  nature,  than  it  is  in  words 
to  confess  God,  yet  not  to  do,  not  to  intend  to  do,  never 
seriously  to  try  to  do  what  he  commands,  or  to  abandon 
what  He  forbids.    If  those  two  sons  in  the  parable  were 


Idols. 


1/3 


ours,  I  know  not  whether  the  smooth  hypocrite,  who, 
bidden  to  go  work  in  the  vineyard,  said,  "  I  go,  sir,"  but 
went  not,  would  not  awaken  in  us  an  even  deeper  indig- 
nation than  the  insolent  rebel  who  said,  "I  will  not." 
Atheism  ?  ah  !  there  are  two  kinds  of  atheism.  There 
is  the  defiant,  speculative  atheism  which  thinks,  or 
thinks  that  it  thinks,  there  is  no  God, — I  do  not  deny 
that  is  a  perilous  and  shameful  aberration.  I  am  quite 
sure  that  it  brings  every  nation  which  falls  into  it  to 
infamy  and  ruin  ;  but  it  is  usually  limited  to  very  few 
among  mankind,  and  even  in  them  the  profession  of  it  is 
apt  to  break  down  at  critical  moments.  The  simple 
question  of  Napoleon,  when,  on  the  deck  of  the  frigate 
which  was  carrying  him  to  Egypt,  the  French  men  of 
science  were  talking  atheism  under  the  starry  sky,  and  he 
rose  and  pointing  to  that  sky  which  hung  over  them  with 
its  myriad  stars,  said,  "It  is  all  very  well,  gentlemen, 
but  who  made  all  those  ? " — that  question  will,  I  say, 
be  alone  sufficient  to  convince  men  of  the  truth  of  the 
first  verse  of  Scripture  :  "  In  the  beginning  God  made 
the  heaven  and  the  earth."  But  practical  atheism  ; 
that  atheism  which,  confessing  God  on  the  lips,  denies 
Him  in  the  life  ;  that  atheism  which,  professing  to  care 
much  for  the  doctrines  of  Christianity,  cares  nothing 
for  its  precepts;  the  regular  utterance  of  "Lord, 
Lord,"  by  men  who  live  in  dishonesty,  adultery,  drunk- 
enness, revellings,  and  all  sorts  of  abominable  idolatries, 
or  what  is  as  bad,  in  the  secret  intrigues  of  selfishness,  in 
the  quotidian  ague  of  frivolity,  in  the  seething  hubbub 
of  slanderous  worldliness,  in  the  "  ghastly  smooth  life 
dead  at  heart"  of  religious  insincerity — how  many  are  the 
atheists,  then  !  And  if  the  love  of  pleasure,  and  the  love 


1 74  Idols. 

of  money,  and  the  love  of  the  world  be  idolatry,  alas  ! 
how  few  of  us  have  truly  kept  even  that  first  command- 
ment, "Thou  shalt  have  none  other  God  but  Me  !" 

And  the  reason  why  we  have  so  imperfectly  kept 
the  first  commandment  may  be  because  neither  have 
we  obeyed  the  spirit  of  the  second.  There  are  far  other 
idols  besides  those  openly  erected  by  the  world,  the 
flesh,  and  the  devil.  The  first  meaning  of  the  word  idols 
— ^idooka — is  false,  shadowy,  fleeting  images  ;  subjec- 
tive phantoms ;  unreal  notions  and  conceptions  of  the 
mind ;  wilful  illusions ;  cherished  fallacies.  It  is  the 
sense  in  which  the  word  is  used  by  our  great  English 
philosopher.  Lord  Bacon.  He  speaks  of  idols  of  the 
tribe,  false  notions  which  seem  inherent  in  the  nature 
of  man,  which,  like  an  unequal  mirror,  mingling  its 
own  nature  with  that  of  the  light,  distorts  and  refracts 
it.  There  are  other  idols  of  the  cave.  Every  man  has 
in  his  heart  some  secret  cavern  in  which  an  idol  lurks, 
reared  there  by  his  temperament  or  his  training,  and 
fed  with  the  incense  of  his  passions,  so  that  a  man,  not 
seeking  God  in  His  word  or  works,  but  only  in  the 
microcosm  of  his  own  heart,  thinks  of  God  not  as  He  is, 
but  as  He  chooses  to  imagine  Him  to  be.  And  there  are 
idols  of  the  market-place,  false  conceptions  of  God 
which  spring  from  men's  intercourse  with  one  another, 
and  from  the  fatal  force  of  words.  And  there  are  idols 
of  the  school,  false  notions  which  come  from  the  spirit 
of  sect,  and  system,  and  party,  and  formal  theology. 
We  do  not  make  to  ourselves  graven  images  of  God,  like 
the  calves  of  Dan  and  Bethel,  but  do  none  of  us  break 
the  second  commandment  even  more  fatally  by  making 
to  ourselves  these  idols — false  notions  of  God — which 


Idols. 


175 


we  accept  in  place  of  the  true  God  ?  My  brethren,  it  is 
a  grave  and  solemn  question.  It  was  false  notions  of 
God  of  which  St.  John  was  mainly  thinking  in  this 
epistle.  Have  we  no  need  of  his  warning — which  was 
addi*essed  to  Christians,  remember,  not  to  heathens — 
"Little  children,  keep  yourselves  from  idols." 

It  was  said,  not  long  ago,  by  a  great  orator  in  the 
House  of  Commons,  that  the  working  classes  care  as 
little  for  the  doctrines  of  Christianity  as  the  upper 
classes  care  for  its  precepts.  If  that  charge  be  true 
(and  none,  I  imagine,  will  deny  that  there  are  some 
grounds  on  which  it  may  be  substantiated),  may  it  not 
be  that  the  God  of  the  worldling  is  an  idol,  a  false  im- 
age, a  totally  wrong  conception  of  the  Living  God  ?  Of 
the  thousands  of  men  of  the  world,  of  the  hundreds  of 
gilded  youths,  of  all  those  in  this  great  city  whose  God 
is  their  belly,  whose  glory  is  in  their  shame,  who  mind 
earthly  things,  not  one  in  a  hundred  but  would  be 
shocked  if  charged  with  not  believing  in  God.  But 
might  not  some  stem  prophet  use  to  him  that  tre- 
mendous sarcasm  of  the  Apostle  James  :  "Thou  be- 
lievest  that  there  is  one  God ;  thou  doest  well.  The 
devils  also  believe — and  more,  more  than  thou  dost — 
they  believe  and  tremble."  Dost  thou  believe  that 
God  is  righteous,  that  He  is  of  purer  eyes  than  to  be- 
hold iniquity  ?  that  He  visiteth  iniquity,  transgression, 
and  sin  ?  Dost  thou  believe  that  the  moral  law  which 
thou  art  violating  deliberately  every  day  is  God's  law  ; 
and  that  thy  sin  will  find  thee  out ;  and  that  though 
hand  Join  in  hand,  the  wicked  shall  not  be  unpunished  ? 
Thousands  either  do  not  believe  this,  or  live  as  if  they 
did  not.    Their  lives  give  the  lie  to  their  lips.  And 


Idols. 


what  can  God  say  to  them  but  this  :  "  Why  dost  thou 
preach  my  laws,  and  takest  my  covenant  in  thy  mouth  ; 
whereas  thou  hatest  to  be  reformed,  and  hast  cast  my 
words  behind  thee  ?  When  thou  sawest  a  thief  thou 
consentedst  unto  him,  and  hast  been  partaker  with  the 
adulterers.  Thou  hast  let  thy  mouth  speak  wickedness, 
and  with  thy  tongue  thou  hast  set  forth  deceit.  These 
things  hast  thou  done,  and  I  held  my  peace,  and  thou 
thoughtest  wickedly  that  I  was  even  such  an  one  as 
thyself  ;  but  I  will  reprove  thee,  and  set  before  thee 
the  things  that  thou  hast  done."  My  brethren,  all 
history,  all  biography,  all  the  voices  of  the  conscience 
of  mankind  bear  witness  that  the  God  who  is  the  idol  of 
the  worldling's  fancy,  the  God  who  is  not  righteous,  the 
God  who  does  not  punish  sin,  is  not  God.  The  bad 
man  knows  not  God.  He  alone  who  strives  to  do  His 
will  can  know  His  doctrine.  To  him  that  ordereth 
his  conversation  aright  will  I  show  the  salvation  of 
God. 

And  if  you  do  not  worship  this  public  idol  of  the 
market-place,  have  you  no  personal  idol  of  the  cave  ? 
You  fully  admit,  you  definitely  believe,  that  in  general 
God  punishes  sin ;  that  He  does  not  clear  the  guilty 
in  their  guilt ;  that  He  did  give  the  moral  law  ;  but, 
turning  God  into  your  private  idol,  do  not  some  of  you 
imagine  that  nevertheless  you  will  get  off  ?  that 
there  is  something  special  in  your  case  ?  that  God  will 
make  an  exception  for  you  ?  that  your  temptations  have 
been  so  strong,  your  chances  so  small,  your  passions 
so  irresistible,  your  circumstances  altogether  so  pecul- 
iar, that  somehow  you  may  sin,  aye,  and  continue  in 
sin,  aye,  and  live  in  sin,  aye,  and  die  in  sin,  and  yet 


Idols. 


177 


somehow  escape  the  consequences  of  sin  ?  If  so,  my 
brethren,  that  is  not  God  whom  you  are  worshipping. 
It  is  an  idol  of  the  cavern,  God  is  a  God  of  laws,  not 
of  exceptions.  God  is  a  God  of  Justice,  not  of  favor- 
itism. Whatever  charge  of  folly  may  justly  attach  to 
the  saying,  "  There  is  no  God,"  that  folly  is  prouder, 
deeper,  and  less  pardonable  which  says  God  will  deal 
differently  with  me  than  with  others.  Because  you  are 
you,  because  you  fancy  that  your  temptations  have  been 
exceptional,  which  is  not  true  ;  because  you  think  that 
your  passions  have  been  strong,  which  means  only  that 
your  reason  has  been  weak  ;  because  you  think  you 
have  so  many  virtues,  and  amiable  qualities  ;  because 
you  love  and  value  yourself  and  your  sins  so  much  that 
you  think  that  God  must  look  partially  upon  them  too — 
shall  God,  because  of  this  self-love,  because  of  these 
filthy  rags  of  your  own  righteousness,  break,  in  your 
case,  and  yours  alone,  the  adamantine  rivet  that  links 
punishment  to  unrepented  crime  ?  So  might  your  idol 
of  the  cavern  do  ;  so  will  not  God  ! 

And  yet,  my  brethren,  if  we  fling  to  the  moles  and 
bats,  these  idols  of  the  market-place  and  of  the  cavern, 
let  not  our  God,  "our  Father  in  Heaven,"  "the  God, 
the  Lord  God,  merciful  and  gracious,  long  sufEering, 
abundant  in  goodness  and  truth,  keeping  mercy  for 
thousands,"  let  Him  not  become  to  us,  as  he  has  be- 
come to  many — as  He  has  become  to  the  Pharisees  of 
this  as  of  all  ages — a  mere  idol  of  the  school.  "God  is 
a  spirit ;  not  confined  to  temples ;  not  bound  up  in 
books  ;  not  cofiined  in  ancient  creeds."  If  it  be  true 
that  the  mass  of  the  working  classes  care  nothing  for  the 
doctrines  of  Christianity,  may  it  not  be,  at  least  in  part, 
12 


178 


Idols. 


because  those  doctrines  have  been  grievously  misrepre- 
sented to  them  ?  The  other  day  a  young  girl  in  a 
London  prison  was  asked,  for  what  purpose  she  thought 
Christ  had  ascended  ?  Her  answer  was,  "  That  He 
might  punish  people."  This  was  her  notion;  it  is 
probably  the  sole  notion  of  thousands  respecting  Him, 
who  died  that  we  might  live,  and  who  ever  liveth  to 
make  intercession  for  us  !  Oh,  my  brethren,  how  can 
we  expect  the  ignorant,  how  can  we  expect  any  to  love 
God,  if  it  is  an  idol  of  the  school  like  this  that  we  de- 
pict for  them  ?  "If  their  religion  be  night,  where  is 
their  day  ?  If  God  is  a  bugbear,  what  is  life  ? "  Is 
there  none  to  tell  them  that  God  punishes  only  because 
He  loves  ;  because  He  would  forgive  ;  because  He  would 
lead  us  away  from  the  one  thing,  the  only  thing  that 
can  be  our  ruin  ?  That  He  punishes  not  one  moment 
longer  when  the  work  of  punishment  is  done  ?  "  When 
I  was  young,"  says  Luther,  "  all  at  once  the  sight  of 
the  Holy  Sacrament,  carried  by  Dr.  Staupitz,  so  terrified 
me  that  I  perspired  at  every  pore,  and  thought  that  I 
should  die  with  fright.  When  the  procession  was  over, 
I  confessed  to  Dr.  Staupitz,  and  told  him  what  had 
happened  to  me.  '  Thy  thoughts,'  he  answered,  '  are 
not  according  to  Christ.  Christ  does  not  terrify ;  He 
consoles.'  Those  words  filled  me  with  joy,  and  were  a 
great  relief  to  my  mind."  Wise  teacher !  true  father 
of  the  Reformation.  Christ  does  not  terrify  :  He  eon- 
soles. 

The  God  of  terrors  ;  the  God  who  is  supposed  to 
elect  a  very  small  number  to  bliss,  and  to  reprobate  all 
the  rest  to  perdition  and  anguish,  by  eternal  decrees, 
for  His  own  glory  j  the  God  who  is  supposed  to  be 


Idols. 


179 


driTen  to  avenging  fury  by  a  wrong  opinion  on  some 
point  of  theology  ;  the  God  who,  in  dreary  human 
systems  of  the  Atonement,  which  are  wholly  unlike 
what  the  Bible  says  of  it,  is  represented  as  so  full  of 
wrath  that,  because  He  must  have  some  victim,  He 
ruthlessly  smites  the  Innocent  ;  the  awful  Moloch 
God  of  the  Inquisition  and  of  intolerance,  who  was 
supposed  to  be  appeased  by  bloodshed,  and  to  look 
favorably  on  those  through  whose  fierceness  the  groans 
of  burning  men  arose  to  heaven,  as  they  gasped  out, 
in  the  fires  of  Seville  and  Toledo,  their  agonizing  souls  ; 
the  God  of  Smithfield  and  of  the  Armada;  the  God 
of  the  gibbet,  the  thumbscrew,  and  the  stake,  and  all 
the  hellish  implements  of  torture  and  tyranny,  used  by 
priests  to  deprave  the  heart  of  mankind  ;  the  God  of 
theological  anathemas  and  religious  hatreds  ;  the  God 
of  fierce  sectarians,  and  ignorant  revivalists, — this  God 
is  not  our  God  ;  never  could  be  our  guide  unto  death. 
"Your  God,"  said  Wesley  to  Whitefield,  when  he  was 
setting  forth  some  hard  system  of  revolting  Calvinism, 
"Your  God  is  my  Devil."  But  our  God  is  He  of 
whom  it  is  said,  "God  is  Love."  If  perfect  love  caste th 
out  fear,  so  no  less  certainly  doth  perfect  fear  cast  out 
love.  Abject  fear,  selfish  fear,  palsied  fear,  degraded 
fear  may  gash  itself,  or  gash  others  with  knives  before 
its  Baalim,  like  a  grovelling  slave  ;  but  the  son,  even 
in  rags,  even  in  hunger,  even  amid  the  swine — when 
he  comes  to  himself,  says:  "I  will  arise,  and  go  to 
my  Father,  and  will  say  unto  him,  'Father,  I  have 
sinned.' " 

And  if  you  ask  how  St.  John,  in  his  Epistlo,  helps 
you  to  obey  his  exhortation  to  keep  yourselves  from 


i8o 


Idols. 


idols,  I  answer  briefly  that  he  helps  you  in  two  ways — 
one  by  telling  you  what  God  is  ;  one  by  pointing  you  to 
His  likeness.  He  tells  you  what  God  is  in  three  sen- 
tences.   "  God  is  righteous,"  he  says.    "  God  is  Light." 

God  is  Love."  God  is  righteous,  and  therefore  He 
hates  all  unrighteousness  in  us,  and  can  be  guilty  of  no 
unrighteousness  in  Himself.  Idols  which  represent  Him 
as  a  God  of  arbitrary  caprice,  treating  men  as  though 
they  were  mere  dead  clay,  to  be  dashed  about  and 
shattered  at  His  will — idols  which  represent  His  justice 
as  alien  from  ours,  and  those  things  as  good  in  Him 
which  would  be  evil  in  us — are  shattered  on  the  rock  of 
truth  that  God  is  righteous. 

Idols  which  represent  Him  as  delighting  in  narrow 
formalism,  self-satisfied  security,  and  bitter  exclusive- 
ness,  making  of  dull  and  acrid  dogmatists  the  sole  elect, 
and  rejecting  the  brighter,  bolder,  larger  natures,  as 
though  he  loved  the  jagged  thistles,  and  the  dwarfed 
bents  better  than  the  rose  of  Sharon  or  the  cedars  of 
Lebanon — idols  of  the  sectarian,  idols  of  the  fanatic, 
idols  of  the  Pharisee,  idols  of  those  whose  loveless  ig- 
norance would  label  themselves  as  the  only  Christians 
and  the  only  Gospellers,  are  shattered  by  the  ringing 
hammer-stroke  of  the  truth  that  God  is  Light. 

Idols  which  only  represent  Him  as  living  a  life  turned 
toward  self,  or  folded  within  self,  caring  only  for  His 
own  "  glory ;"  caring  nothing  for  the  endless  agonies  of 
the  creatures  He  has  made;  burning  with  implacable 
wrath  against  little  deviations  of  opinion;  regarding 
even  the  sins  of  children  as  deserving  of  infinite  punish- 
ment, because,  though  they  are  finite.  He  is  infinite  : — 
idols  of  the  zealot,  idols  of  the  ecclesiastic — idols  of 


Idols. 


i8i 


those  who  think  that  their  puny  wrath  can  work  the 
righteousness  of  God — are  dashed  to  pieces  by  the  sweep- 
ing and  illimitable  force  of  the  truth  that  God  is  love. 
Yes,  with  these  axes  and  hammers  of  the  word,  break 
down  the  carved  images  of  idol  temples,  whether  they 
be  reared  by  systematizing  theology  or  by  ruthless  syl- 
logism, by  religious  hatred  or  by  selfish  guilt — and  so 
"Little  children,  keep  yourselves  from  idols." 

But,  lastly,  St.  John  will  not  merely  leave  you  to 
what  is  abstract.  He  will  point  you  to  One  whom  he 
had  seen  and  heard,  and  his  hands  had  handled,  even  the 
Word  of  Life  ;  to  One  who  was  the  brightness  of  God's 
glory  and  the  express  image  of  His  person.  "  This,"  he 
says,  "  is  the  true  God  and  eternal  life."  My  brethren,  if 
you  would  know  God,  the  only  begotten,  who  is  in  the 
bosom  of  the  Father,  He  hath  declared  Him.  And 
what  do  we  learn  of  God  from  Him  ?  How  can  I  com- 
press it  into  a  few  words  ?  Ah,  my  brethren,  read  the 
Four  Gospels;  read  them  for  yourselves;  read  them  with 
eyes  unblinded  by  the  fogs  of  traditional  exegesis  ;  read 
the  revelation  of  God  in  the  human  life,  in  the  spoken 
words  of  your  Saviour.  Do  not  go  to  human  systems  of 
Theology,  do  not  seek  human  conceptions  of  Art  in  order 
to  understand  him.  If  you  trust  even  to  Thomas 
a  Kempis,  he  will  draw  you  a  picture  of  Christ  which 
leaves  out  of  sight  altogether  the  most  essential  features 
of  His  ministry — that  "He  went  about  doing  good." 
If  you  rely  on  religious  teachers  they  may  offer  you  a 
dead  Christ  for  the  living  Christ;  an  agonized  Christ  for 
the  ascended  Christ;  an  ecclesiastical  Christ  for  the  spirit- 
ual Christ;  a  Christ  of  the  elect  few  for  the  Christ  of  the 
sinful  many ;  a  petty,  formalizing,  sectarian  Christ  for 


l82 


Idols. 


the  royal  Lord  of  the  great  free  heart  of  manhood ; 
a  Christ  of  the  fold  for  the  Christ  of  the  one 
great  flock ;  a  Christ  of  Gerizim  or  of  Jerusalem,  of 
Eome  or  of  Geneva,  of  Oxford  or  of  Clapham,  for 
the  Christ  of  the  Universal  World. 

If  you  turn  to  Art,  if  you  would  evoke  even  the  genius 
of  a  Michael  Angelo  to  set  forth  Christ  to  you,  he  would 
make  the  Sistine  Chapel  flame  with  tumultuous  imagery, 
in  the  midst  of  which  a  wrathful,  pitiless,  avenging 
Christ  turns  away  from  the  redeemed,  turns  away  even 
from  His  pitying,  pleading  human  mother,  to  hurl  from 
His  burning  right  hand  ten  thousand  thunders  on  the 
crushed,  convulsed,  demon-tortured,  innumerable  mul- 
titude, for  whom  He  died  in  vain.  No  !  turn 
from  these  shadows :  face  the  sun.  Look  at  Christ 
Himself.  See  Him  in  His  acts.  Stern,  indeed,  to  the 
Pharisee  and  to  the  hypocrite,  and  dwelling  on  the 
awful  breadth,  and  grandeur,  and  searchingness  of  the 
moral  law.  Yet  ever  tender  to  sorrow,  with  an  infinite 
tenderness  releasing  the  demoniac,  giving  sight  to  the 
Wind,  cleansing  the  leper,  preaching  to  the  poor,  eating 
with  sinners,  feeding  the  hungry  multitude,  welcoming 
the  outcast  publican,  suffering  the  weeping  woman  who 
was  a  sinner  to  wash  His  feet  with  her  tears,  and  wipe 
them  with  the  hairs  of  her  head,  praying  for  His  very 
murderers  as  they  were  driving  the  nails  through  His 
hands  upon  the  Cross.  If  you  would  know  how  God 
loves  even  the  guiltiest  of  His  children,  see  Misery 
left  alone  with  Mercy  on  the  Temple  floor,  and  hear 
the  voice  so  awful  in  its  warning,  yet  so  solemn  in 
its  tenderness,  "  Neither  do  I  condemn  thee ;  go  and 
sin  no  more."   And  he  who  thus  represented  God  by 


Idols. 


183 


His  acts,  how  did  He  represent  Him  in  His  words  ? 
Was  it  not  solely,  essentially,  exclusively  as  a  Father  ? 
as  "  our  Father  Avhich  art  in  Heaven  ; "  as  the  God  who 
maketh  the  sun  to  rise  on  the  evil  and  the  good,  and 
sendeth  rain  on  the  just  and  on  the  unjust ;  as  the  God  of 
little  children,  whose  angels  behold  His  face  in  heaven ; 
as  the  God  of  the  lilies  and  the  ravens;  the  God  of  the 
lost  sheep;  the  God  of  the  falling  sparrow;  the  God  of 
the  Prodigal  Son;  the  God  by  whom  the  very  hairs  of 
our  head  are  all  numbered;  in  one  word,  which  com- 
prises all,  the  God  of  love  ?  Yes,  this  is  the  true  God 
and  Eternal  Life. 

Dear  God  and  Father  of  us  all, 

Forgive  our  faith  in  cruel  lies. 

Forgive  the  blindness  that  denies, 
Forgive  thy  creature,  when  he  takes 

For  the  all-perfect  love  Thou  art 

Some  grim  creation  of  his  heart. 
Cast  down  our  idols ;  overturn 

Our  bloody  altars  :  let  us  see 

Thyself  in  Thy  humanity. 

So  long  as  we  worship  idols;  so  long  as  we  take  pleas- 
ure in  unrighteousness  ;  so  long  as  we  love  the  darkness 
rather  than  the  light ;  so  long  as  we  mingle  human 
hatreds  with  our  worship  of  Him;  so  long  as  we  swear 
(like  those  in  Zephaniah)  by  Him  and  by  Moloch,  or  like 
the  Samaritans  of  old,  fear  the  Lord  and  serve  our 
own  gods  ;  so  long  we  cannot  see  Him,  neither  know 
Him,  For  Scripture  itself  teaches  us  that  if  with  the 
merciful  He  will  show  Himself  merciful,  and  with  the 
upright,  upright ;  and  with  the  pure,  pure  ;  so  with 
the  froward  will  he  show  Himself  froward.    And  be- 


Idols. 


cause  to  know  Him  is  life,  and  eternal  life,  and  because 
there  is  no  other  life,  since  all  other  life  is  but  a  living 
death,  therefore  St.  John  wrote,  as  the  last  word  of  his 
epistle,  as  the  last  word  of  the  whole  revelation  of  the 
New  Testament,  Little  children,  keep  yourselves  from 
idols. 


SERMON  XII. 


Preached  in  Teesity  Chuech,  Boston,  Nov.  1,  1885. 


"  All  my  delight  is  upon  the  saints  that  are  in  the  earth,  and 
npon  such  as  excel  in  virtue. " — Ps.  xvi.  3. 

Since  the  seventh  century  the  first  day  of  this  month 
has  been  dedicated  to  the  memory  of  All  Saints,  and  in 
many  religious  communities,  since  the  tenth  century, 
November  2  is  set  apart  for  the  commemoration  of  All 
Souls.  This  latter  day  has  been  dropped  from  our 
calendar  only  because  it  was  mixed  up  with  Romish 
views  about  Purgatory  and  masses  for  the  dead.  Other- 
wise, a  day  devoted  to  meditation  on  All  Souls — in  the 
strictest  sense  of  the  word — in  connection  with  a  day  of 
All  Saints,  suggests  thoughts  as  solemn,  and  I  trust  as 
profitable,  as  almost  any  on  which  our  minds  could 
dwell. 

1.  The  great  procession  of  mankind,  in  its  unnum- 
bered millions,  is  ever  sweeping  across  the  narrow  stage 
of  life,  issuing  from  a  darkness  in  which  they  were  not, 
passing  into  a  darkness  in  which  they  are  seen  no  more. 
We  watch  that  procession  as  it  winds  through  the  long 


i86        The  Example  of  the  Saints. 

centuries  of  history,  and  we  note  its  most  striking 
figures.  Some  are  kings,  who  built  pyramids  and  sub- 
dued nations,  and  held  absolute  sway  over  the  destinies 
of  their  fellow-men.  Some  are  poets,  with  their  gar- 
lands and  singing  robes  about  them ;  some  are  great 
discoverers,  who  enlarged  the  power  of  man  over  the 
forces  of  nature  ;  some  are  great  philosophers,  who 
widened  the  limits  of  human  thought ;  some  are  lovers 
of  their  fellow-men,  the  reformers  of  abuses,  the  slayers 
of  dragons,  the  triumphers  over  long-continued  tyranny; 
some  are  men  "  who  have  uplifted  their  strong  arms  to 
bring  heaven  a  little  nearer  to  the  earth."  My  own  life 
places  me  under  the  shadow  of  that  great  Abbey  where 
I  am  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  the  tombs  and  ceno- 
taphs of  such  famous  men  as  these  ;  but  it  is  not  of 
such  as  these  that  the  great  procession  of  humanity  is 
mainly  composed.  The  vast  masses  of  it  consist  of  a 
nameless  throng,— the  poor,  the  ordinary,  the  average, 
the  undistinguished  ;  men  whose  little  lives  gleamed  for 
a  moment  out  of  the  eternities  and  disappeared  ;  men 
who  did  but  write  their  names  in  water  ;  men  who 
barely  for  one  moment  scratched  their  story  on  icy 
pillars,  which  were  melted  by  the  next  morning's  sun ; 
men  who  lie  in  earth's  millions  of  nameless  graves,  the 
meaning,  and  even  the  bare  fact  of  their  existence 
obliterated  from  all  human  memory  and  every  human 
record  for  evermore.  To  our  eyes  mankind  is  mainly 
divided  into  the  eminent  and  the  obscure ;  the  known 
and  the  unknown  ;  the  great  and  the  small  ;  the  rulers 
and  the  ruled  ;  the  learned  and  the  ignorant ;  and  it  is 
to  the  latter  classes — to  those  whom  the  world  would 
call  the  unimportant,  the  insignificant — that  the  great 


The  Example  of  the  Saints.  iZ'j 

multitude  of  every  generation — the  great  multitude  of 
this,  as  of  every  assemblage  of  worshippers,  have  always 
belonged.  Savage  and  civilized,  in  every  age,  in  every 
region,  the  immense  majority  of  men — some  with  lives 
that  came  to  nothing,  some  with  deeds  as  well  undone — 
have  withered  like  the  flower  of  grass,  have  vanished 
like  a  bubble,  have  "sunk  as  lead  in  the  mighty  waters." 
After  a  year  or  two  they  lie  in  the  grave  like  sheep, 
"  there  the  wicked  cease  from  troubling,  and  there  the 
weary  be  at  rest.  There  the  prisoners  are  at  ease,  they 
hear  not  the  driver's  voice.  The  small  and  great  are 
there,  and  the  servant  is  free  from  his  master." 

2.  But  to  the  eye  of  God — to  the  eyes,  it  may  be,  of 
all  good  and  evil  spirits,  the  aspect  of  that  procession  is 
very  different.  To  them  the  inch-high  differences  of 
human  rank  have  no  existence  ;  for  them  the  thistles  of 
human  loftiness  have  no  elevation,  and  the  molehills 
cast  no  shadow.  They,  as  they  gaze  on  this  marvellous 
procession  of  human  life,  know  only  the  difference  be- 
tween the  good  and  the  evil  ;  between  those  who  fear 
God  and  those  who  reject  Him  ;  between  those  who 
love  and  those  who  only  hate  and  injure  their  neigh- 
bors ;  between  the  holy  and  the  unholy,  the  forgiven 
and  the  impenitent,  the  saved  and  the  unsaved  souls. 
Human  wealth,  human  success,  human  greatness — the 
wretched  thing  we  are  all  tempted  to  honor  more  than 
that  which  is  pure  and  lovely — to  covet  more  than  God's 
benediction  and  Heaven's  own  gold — what  is  it  ?  how 
long  does  it  last  ?  what  is  it  worth  ?  "  When  I  forget 
my  king,  may  my  God  forget  me,"  said  one  who  had  risen 
from  obscurity  to  be  Lord  Cliancellor  of  England.  "  It 
is  the  best  thing  he  could  do  for  you,"  exclaimed  Ed- 


1 88        The  Example  of  the  Saints. 


mund  Burke,  who  heard  the  apostrophe.  Ah  !  how 
infinitely  better  would  it  have  been  for  many  of  earth's 
successful  men  to  have  been  unknown  here,  and  to  have 
been  failures  here,  not  rich,  not  prosperous,  not  re- 
nowned, and  at  the  same  time 

"  Not  left  in  God's  contempt  apart, 
With  ghastly  smooth  life  dead  at  heart." 

3.  In  the  fine  gradations  of  human  character  and  the 
complex  motives  of  human  action,  it  is  only  in  certain 
marked  instances  that  we  can  make  any  of  the  broad 
distinctions  which  can  be  made  by  those  spiritual  beings 
who  see  us  with  larger  eyes  than  ours.  We  can  see  that 
some  men  have  dared  to  be  eminently  good,  and  that 
other  men  have  been  conspicuously  and  infamously  bad. 
But  most  men's  lives  and  characters  wear  in  our  eyes  a 
very  mixed  aspect.  They  are  not  carved  in  marble, 
they  are  woven  in  gossamer.  They  show  interchanging 
elements  of  good  and  evil,  which  run  together  like  warp 
and  woof  in  the  varying  web.  We  see  human  sin  and 
weakness  even  in  the  good.  We  see  here  and  there  a 
gleam  of  saintliness  even  in  the  unsaintly.  Only  the 
balances  of  God  are  perfect.  He  alone,  putting  the  just 
weights  into  the  even  scales,  can  pronounce  on  the 
whole  life  of  most  men— that  they  "  did  that  which 
was  good,"  or  "did  that  which  was  evil,"  in  the  sight 
of  the  Lord.  It  is  a  significant  fact  that  while  the 
Church  of  God  has  canonized  and  beatified  so  large  a 
number  of  her  sons,  there  is  scarcely  one,  if  one — 
scarcely  even  the  soul  of  a  Judas  Iscariot — whom  she 
has  ventured — and  even  that  timidly,  and  even  that 
beyond  her  authority — to  doom  to  everlasting  woe. 


The  Example  of  the  Saints.  189 

But  though  we  can  never  pronounce  judgment  on  the 
future  of  any  man,  we  cannot  help  seeing  that  some 
have  been,  according  to  all  human  judgment,  bad  men 
and  bad  women,  and  that  some  few  have  been  the 
saints  of  God. 

4.  Bad  men  and  bad  women  : — we  think  of  them  with 
pain  and  shrinking  sorrow;  we  think  that  for  mankind, 
at  any  rate,  it  had  been  better  if  they  had  never  been. 
All  those  who  have  lived  only  to  gratify  the  mean  and 
sensual  egotism  of  a  hungry,  shivering  self ;  all  those 
whose  lifelong  example  had  deepened  man's  feverish 
thirst  for  gold  ;  all  those  who  have  heaped  up  for  them- 
selves riches  as  for  a  day  of  slaughter,  by  oppression, 
robbery,  or  wrong  ;  all  who  by  the  unlawful  indulgence 
of  their  lowest  passions  have  contributed  to  poison  the 
life-blood  of  mankind  ;  all  whose  words  or  writings  have 
infected  the  stream  of  life  with  the  leprous  distillment 
of  polluted  thoughts ;  all  those  who  by  the  shameful 
perversion  of  art  and  literature — laying  unhallowed 
incense  on  the  altar  of  genius,  and  mingling  with 
strange  flames  her  vestal  fire — have  inflamed  the  fever- 
ish passion  of  morbid  imaginations ;  all  who  have 
helped  to  degrade  life  from  its  sweet  and  serious  sanc- 
tity into  vulgarism  and  frivolity  ;  all  who  have  been  the 
greedy  and  cruel  disseminators  of  gossip,  slander,  and 
lies ;  all  whose  example  has  rendered  the  actions  of  men 
viler,  and  their  thoughts  more  trivial ;  all  who  have 
painted  the  gates  of  Hell  with  Paradise  ;  all  who  have 
striven  to  hand  on  and  to  perpetuate  evil  traditions  ;  all 
who  have  flourished  by  the  causes  of  human  misery  and 
ruin  ;  all  who  have  delighted  to  speak  words  that  may 
do  hurt ;  all  the  idle  cumberers  of  the  ground  whose 


I90        The  Example  of  the  Saints. 

root  has  been  as  rottenness,  and  their  blossom  gone  up 
as  dust ;  all  whose  god  is  their  belly,  whose  glory  is  in 
their  shame,  who  mind  earthly  things.  The  world  may 
give  them  fortunes,  or  coronets,  or  loud  applause,  but 
these  are  bad  men  and  bad  women.  And  if  all  mankind 
had  been  as  these  have  been  and  are — if  there  had  been 
no  salt  of  the  earth  amid  its  corruption,  no  twinkling 
stars  amid  its  midnight ;  if,  like  the  seething  of  the 
gi-ape-bundles  in  the  uncleansed  wine-vat,  earth  had  been 
nothing  but  a  ferment  of  man's  vileness,  vanity,  and 
lust ;  if  there  had  been  none  on  earth  but  those  four 
classes  whom  God  most  hates — mockers,  liars,  hypo- 
crites, and  slanderers — then  indeed  Earth  had  been  an 
anticipated  Hell.  "Without  are  dogs,  and  sorcerers,  and 
whoremongers,  and  murderers,  and  idolaters,  and  every 
one  that  loveth  and  maketh  a  lie." 

5.  And  as  for  all  these  we  judge  them  not.  We  know 
nothing  of  their  temptations.  We  take  not  heaven's 
thunder  into  our  puny  grasp.  We 

"Avert  our  eyes,  nor  follow  them 
Into  that  dark,  obscure,  sequestered  state 
Where  God  unmakes  but  to  remake  the  soul, 
He  else  made  first  in  vain  ;  which  must  not  be." 

But  oh  !  with  what  unspeakable  relief  do  we  turn  from 
these  works  of  darkness,  and  them  who  delight  therein, 
to  the  saints  of  God  !  In  them,  in  them,  is  the  healing 
of  the  world.  Do  not  think  of  the  mere  title,  "saints." 
That  is  at  the  best  an  unwarranted  and  precarious  title. 
It  has  been  given  to  some  at  least  of  the  unworthy,  and 
denied  to  many  of  the  good.  On  All  Saints'  Day  we 
may  think  not  only  of  all  whom  the  Church  has  called 


The  Example  of  the  Saints.  191 

**  saints,"  but  also  of  the  long  line  who  are  not  included 
in  that  very  partial  and  imperfect  calendar.  Think  of 
the  heroes  of  faith  in  olden  times ;  of  the  Patriarchs ; 
Enoch,  the  blameless ;  Noah,  the  faithful ;  Abraham, 
the  friend  of  God ;  of  the  sweet  and  meditative  Isaac  ; 
of  the  afflicted  and  wrestling  Jacob.  Think  of  Moses, 
the  meekest  of  men ;  of  the  brave  Jiidges ;  of  glorious 
Prophets  ;  of  patriot  warriors ;  of  toiling  Apostles ;  of 
the  many  confessors  who  would  rather  die  than  lie  ;  of 
martyrs  uplifting  radiant  and  enraptured  faces  from 
the  agonizing  flames.  We  may  think  of  the  Hermits, 
who,  from  the  guilt  and  turmoil  of  life,  fled  into  the 
solitude  of  the  wilderness;  of  the  missionaries — St. 
Paul,  Columban,  Boniface,  Francis  Xavier,  John  Eliot, 
David  Brainerd,  Adoniram  Judson,  Henry  Martyn, 
Coleridge  Pattison ;  of  Eeformers,  who  cleared  the 
world  of  lies,  like  Savonarola,  Huss,  Luther,  Zwingli, 
Wesley,  Whitfield ;  of  wise  rulers,  like  Alfred,  and  St. 
Louis,  and  Washington,  and  Lincoln,  and  Garfleld  ;  of 
the  writers  of  holy  books,  like  Thomas  a  Kempis,  and 
Baxter,  and  Bunyan,  and  Jeremy  Taylor  ;  of  those  who, 
like  Howard,  brought  deliverance  to  the  captive,  who, 
like  Lloyd  Garrison,  unriveted  the  fetters  of  the  slave ; 
of  good  Bishops,  like  Hugo  of  Avalon,  and  Fenelon, 
and  Berkeley;  of  good  pastors,  like  Oberlin  and  Fletcher 
of  Madeley,  and  Adolphe  Monod,  and  Felix  Neff ;  of  all 
true  Poets — whether  sweet  and  holy  like  George  Her- 
bert, and  Cowper,  and  Keble,  and  Longfellow;  or  grand 
and  mighty  like  Dante  and  Milton — what  earthly  mar- 
ble is  white  enough  to  build  the  monument  of  these  ? 
These  are  but  a  few  of  the  many  names  of  those  who 
have  reflected  the  glory  of  their  Master,  Christ,  and  who 


192        The  Example  of  the  Saints. 

walk  with  Him  in  white  robes,  for  they  are  worthy. 
My  brethren,  if  you  would  comfort  your  hearts,  if  you 
would  strengthen  your  good  resolutions,  if  you  would 
retain  that  high  estimate  of  human  nature  which  so 
often  threatens  to  succumb  when  we  look  at  the  sicken- 
ing exhibitions  of  moral  revolt  and  disorder  on  every 
side  of  us,  most  earnestly  indeed  would  I  urge  you  to 
make  yourselves  acquainted  witli  the  story  of  Christians 
such  as  these.  Next  to  the  Gospels  and  Epistles  of  the 
New  Testament  it  is  the  best  antidote  to  the  degeneracy 
of  worldly  and  evil  days ;  from  earth's  mire  and  dark- 
ness lift  up  your  eyes  to  this  galaxy  of  great  examples. 
When  evil,  and  baseness,  and  triviality  is  being  thrust 
upon  us  on  all  sides — when  men  take  it  for  a  sign  of 
genius  to  degrade  and  depreciate,  to  impute  and  to  pol- 
lute— amid  all  this  fuss,  and  chatter,  and  hurry,  and 
acrid  ill-nature — amid  reams  of  frivolous  fiction,  humili- 
ating gossip,  and  unprofitable  oratory — amid  all  the 
place-hunting,  and  the  gold-hunting — have  we  no  time 
to  think  of  things  eternal  ?  have  we  no  desire  to  possess 
our  souls  in  peace  and  nobleness  ?  have  we  no  need  of 
something  to  keep  alive  our  faith  in  the  dignity  of 
man  ? 

6.  I  for  one  find  that  something  most  of  all  in  dwell- 
ing on  the  life  and  sufferings  of  Christ,  and  next  in 
considering  the  blessed  example  of  those  who  have  fol- 
lowed Him,  bearing  each  his  own  cross.  Let  me  point 
out  two  of  the  many  ways  in  which  it  seems  to  me  that 
this  contemplation  of  these  our  worthier  and  nobler 
brothers  in  the  great  family  of  Christ  may  be  most 
blessed  and  useful  to  us. 

i.  In  laying  down  the  laws  of  observation,  the  great 


The  Example  of  the  Saints.  193 


philosopher  of  the  Novum  Organum  describes  what  he 
calls  "  the  prerogative  of  instances,"  and  among  them 
he  speaks  of  instances  which  he  calls  ostensivcs  or 
elucescentes — instances  which  show  any  quality  in  its 
purest  exaltation,  in  its  fullest  vigor.  Now,  the  saints 
of  God  furnish  us  with  just  such  instantice  elucescentes 
of  pure  and  possible  human  goodness.  God  has  made 
clear  to  us  His  will.  In  all  His  Bibles,  in  Scripture,  in 
Nature,  in  history,  in  experience,  in  conscience,  He  has 
taught  us  that  certain  things  are  good  and  certain 
things  are  evil.  When  God  was  made  man,  and  dwelt 
among  us  in  the  life  of  our  Lord  and  Master  Jesus 
Christ,  God  translated  for  us  His  revelation  into  the 
plainest  of  human  language.  So  Christ  was  the  Word 
of  God,  and  Christ's  saints  show  us  the  acceptance  of 
His  word,  the  reality  of  His  power.  They  show  us  how, 
through  faith  in  Christ,  and  by  the  spirit  of  Christ,  and 
because  of  prayer  to  God  through  Christ,  men  weak  as 
we  are,  tempted  as  we  are,  yet  did  gloriously  and  con- 
spicuously triumph  over  sin,  the  world,  the  flesh,  and 
the  devil,  and  thereby  made  manifest  to  us  that  we  can 
do  the  same.  They  have  proved  to  us  that  even  in  such 
a  world  as  this,  and  even  for  hearts  so  poor  and  weak  as 
ours,  it  is  possible  to  be  good  and  pure  and  true  by  the 
help  of  God,  because  by  the  help  of  God  they  were  so, 
and  that  with  no  greater  strength  than  we  may  obtain. 
They  refute  the  excuse  of  our  feebleness  ;  they  cut  away 
the  lie  of  our  inability. 

ii.  It  needs,  for  instance,  but  a  short  experience  of 
life  to  see  that  the  mass  of  men  are  predominantly  self- 
ish.   Self  is  the  all  but  universal  idol ;  selfishness  is 
for  millions  the  sole  law  of  existence.    Men  jostle  each 
13 


194 


The  Example  of  the  Saints. 


other,  and  straggle  in  the  press,  and  trample  savagely 
on  fallen  rivals,  and  show  the  poor  spectacle  of  that 
perverted  life  which  lives  and  dies  only  for  itself.  And 
yet  it  is  possible  for  men  to  become — and  thousands  of 
men  have  become — perfectly,  beautifully  unselfish,  car- 
ing honestly  for  the  happiness  of  others  more  than  for 
their  own.  St.  Macarius,  the  hermit,  lived  in  the  desert 
in  a  little  community  of  solitaries.  One  day  there  was 
brought  to  him  that  -which,  in  the  hot  desert,  is  the 
most  tempting  and  exquisite  of  all  luxuries — a  bunch  of 
fresh  purple  grapes,  with  the  bloom  and  mist  of  their 
delicious  ripeness  upon  them.  Macarius  hated  the 
thought  of  taking  them  himself ;  he  preferred  that 
another  should  enjoy  the  boon,  and  handed  it  to  one 
of  the  brothers  ;  but  the  same  motive  was  strong  in  him, 
and  he  gave  it  to  another.  But  again  this  other  pre- 
ferred the  enjoyment  of  a  companion  to  his  own  ;  and 
so,  in  the  absolute  unselfishness  of  that  little  community, 
the  untouched,  tempting  grapes,  which  would  have  been 
so  cool,  so  refreshing  in  the  burning  day,  were  handed 
from  one  to  another,  none  wishing  to  keep  what  would  be 
pleasant  to  his  fellow,  till  at  last  they  were  handed  back 
to  Macarius  again.  Unselfishness,  you  see,  had  become 
as  completely  the  law  of  that  little  brotherhood  as 
selfishness  is  the  law  of  the  common  world.  Oh,  how 
infinitely  lovelier  is  the  spectacle  presented  by  these 
saints  of  God,  and  their  love  for  one  another,  than  is 
daily  presented  in  this  hard,  modern  life.  "The  high 
desire  that  others  should  be  blest  savors  of  heaven." 

iii.  Again,  we  need  not  look  far  to  see  the  pride  of 
men.  It  is  so  common  that  it  seems  to  be  as  strong  in 
the  poorest  and  meanest  as  in  the  great.    We  see  it — 


The  Example  of  the  Saints.  195 


and  its  weak  satellites,  conceit  and  vanity — in  the  look 
of  men  ;  it  is  shown  in  their  gait ;  we  hear  it  in  their 
very  accents.  And  never  was  the  tendency  stronger 
than  now  to  be  self-assertive  ;  to  be  vain ;  to  say  to 
every  one  else,  "I  am  just  as  good  as  you  ;"  to  resent 
with  fierce  bitterness  the  notion  that  "  they  call  this 
man  as  good  as  me."  Pride  is  the  one  Protean  spirit 
which  takes  many  forms  in  envy,  hatred,  back-biting, 
spurious  liberty,  false  independence.  And  yet  it  is  quite 
possible  even  for  man,  proud  man,  to  become  resigned, 
humble,  submissive,  meek  ;  not  to  seek  great  things  for 
himself ;  to  take  the  lowest  place  ;  to  think  others  better 
than  himself  ;  to  pluck  that  violet  of  humility  which 
blossoms  only  at  the  foot  of  the  cross.  Again,  let  me 
illustrate  by  an  example.  St.  Thomas  of  Aquino  was 
by  far  the  greatest  man  of  his  age  ;  of  noble  birth,  of 
ancient  lineage,  of  fine  appearance,  the  most  consum- 
mate theologian,  supreme  in  learning  and  goodness,  the 
friend  of  popes  and  kiugs.  In  position  he  was  but  a 
humble  monk.  He  chose  that  position  by  preference. 
Voluntarily  he  took  the  lowest  place.  One  day  at 
Bologna,  a  stranger  arriving  asked  the  Prior  for  some 
one  to  help  him  to  get  provisions  and  carry  his  basket. 
"Tell  the  first  brother  you  meet,"  said  the  Prior.  St. 
Thomas  was  walking  in  meditation  in  the  cloister,  and, 
not  knowing  him,  the  stranger  said  :  "  Your  Prior  bids 
you  to  follow  me."  Without  a  word  the  great  teacher 
— the  Angel  of  the  Schools,  as  he  was  called  by  the  aft'ec- 
tion  of  his  admirers — bowed  his  head,  took  the  basket, 
and  followed.  But  he  was  suffering  from  lameness, 
and  since  he  was  unable  to  keep  up,  the  stranger  rated 
him  soundly  as  a  lazy,  good-for-nothing  fellow,  who 


196         The  Example  of  the  Saints. 

ought  to  show  more  zeal  in  religious  obedience.  The 
saint  meekly  bore  the  unjust  reproaches,  and  answered 
never  a  word,  "Do  you  know  whom  you  are  treating 
in  this  rude  way  ? "  said  the  indignant  citizens,  who 
witnessed  the  scene.  "That  is  Brother  Thomas  of 
Aquino."  "Brother  Thomas  of  Aquino!"  said  the 
stranger,  in  amazement ;  and  immediately  throwing 
himself  on  his  knees,  with  sobs  and  tears,  he  begged  to 
be  forgiven.  "Nay,"  said  the  angelic  Doctor,  "it  is  I 
who  should  ask  forgiveness,  since  I  have  not  been  so 
active  as  I  should  have  been."  And  this  humility,  so 
rare  in  little  men,  was  the  chief  characteristic  of  this 
truly  great  man.  Once,  when  he  was  reading  aloud  in 
his  monastery,  the  Prior  thought  he  had  made  a  false 
quantity  and  corrected  him.  He  instantly  altered  the 
word.  "  Why  did  you  not  tell  the  Prior  that  you  were 
right  ?  "  asked  the  monks  afterwards.  "  The  quantity 
of  the  word  was  no  consequence,"  he  answered  ;  "  but  it 
was  of  consequence  that  I  should  be  obedient. "  Once, 
again,  when  he  was  addressing  a  vast  congregation  in 
one  of  the  chief  churches  of  Paris,  an  insolent  intruder 
beckoned  to  him  to  stop,  and  aimed  at  him  an  abusive 
harangue.  The  saint  waited  till  he  had  ended,  and 
then,  without  one  word  of  anger  or  resentment,  calmly 
continued  his  discourse.  From  that  disciplined  and 
noble  spirit  all  pride  had  been  expelled.  "  Give  me,  0 
Lord,"  such  was  his  daily  prayer,  "  give  me,  0  Lord, 
a  noble  heart  which  no  earthly  affection  can  drag 
down." 

7.  Once  again  take  the  common  temptation  to  sacri- 
fice all  to  ambition.  It  is,  perhaps,  the  least  ignoble  of 
human  weaknesses — 


The  Example  of  the  Saints.  197 


"  Fame  is  the  spur  which  the  clear  spirit  doth  raise, 
The  last  infirmity  of  noble  minds." 

The  last  infirmity,  and  yet  a  real  infirmity.  Even  a 
Caesar,  even  a  Cromwell,  desired  not  power  only,  but 
tlie  glittering  baubles  which  are  its  symbols.  It  is 
said — a  stranger  only  touches  on  such  a  subject  with 
reserve  and  modesty — that  many  a  fine  career  has  been 
ruined,  many  a  noble  nature  shipwrecked  among  you, 
upon  the  sunken  reefs  which  strew  the  stormy  sea  of 
political  ambition  ;  that  there  have  been  men  who  were 
tempted  to  palter  with  eternal  God  for  power  ;  men 
who  have  staked  all,  and  lost,  on  the  possibility  of 
attaining  one  mighty  prize.  The  desire  for  such  a  prize 
is  only  wrong  when  it  tempts  any  man  to  deflect,  Avere 
it  but  so  much  as  the  division  of  a  hair,  from  the 
straight  line  of  duty.  Might  not  the  example  of  the 
saints  help  us  here  also  ?  Is  there  no  such  thing  as  a 
noble  desire  to  descend  ?  St.  Gregory  tells  us,  in  his 
life  of  St.  Benedict,  how  "  one  night,  just  before  the 
hour  of  those  holy  hymns  which  exhale  from  the  cloister 
in  the  midst  of  silence  and  darkness,  Benedict  was  gaz- 
ing upon  heaven  from  the  window  of  his  cell.  A 
mystical  light  shone  round  about  him,  and  the  whole 
world  was  brought  before  him  as  if  it  had  been  gathered 
up  into  one  ray  of  sunlight.  '  He  saw  it,'  says  the  in- 
scription which  is  read  to  this  day  in  the  tower  in 
which  he  dwelt  on  Monte  Cassino,  '  he  saw  it  and  he 
scorned  it.'  "  Inspexit  et  despexit.  Did  not  Christ,  the 
King  of  saints,  do  the  same  ?  Did  He  not  turn  Hia 
back  on  all  the  kingdoms  of  the  world  and  the  glory  of 
them  ?  Yes ;  and  are  there  not  better  things  within 
our  reach  which  neither  time  can  tarnish  nor  death 


198        The  Example  of  the  Saints. 

destroy  ?  Integrity  ;  self-denial ;  self-possession  ;  self- 
conquest  ;  disinterested  labors  for  the  happiness  of 
others  ;  patient  endurance  ;  humble  faith  ; — are  not 
these  happier,  more  eternal,  more  divine  ? 

' '  Oh  scene  of  fortune,  that  doth  fair  appear 
Only  to  men  who  stand  not  near  ; 
Proud  Poverty,  that  tinsel  bravery  wears. 
And,  like  a  rainbow,  painted  tears. 

Be  prudent,  and  the  shore  in  prospect  keep, 
In  a  weak  boat  trust  not  the  deep  ; 
Placed  beneath  envy,  above  envying  rise  ; 
Pity  great  men,  great  things  despise." 

"  Seeketh  thou  great  things  for  thyself  ?  Seek  them 
not,  saith  the  Lord." 

8.  I  might  give  you  other  instances,  no  less  decisive, 
of  the  attainment  of  other  high  virtues  by  weak  mor- 
tal men.  I  might,  for  instance,  show  you  how  the 
saints  of  God  have  obtained  a  perfect  purity,  or  a  per- 
fect contempt  for  all  worldly  ends.  But  let  me  rather 
point  a  second  great  lesson.  If  it  be  an  infinitely  better 
and  greater  thing  to  be  a  Christian  than  to  be  a  king  ;  if 
the  poorest  Lazarus  who  ever  lay  at  a  rich  man's  gate 
may  be  nobler  and  happier  than  the  most  gorgeous 
Dives  ;  then  how  far  higher  must  it  be  than  every 
human  distinction  to  be  a  saint  of  God  ?  Yet  if  every 
other  avenue  be  closed  to  us,  the  highest  of  all  ambi- 
tions is  open  to  the  humblest  of  us  all.  And  what  a 
true  end  and  aim  in  life  is  this  !  If  at  any  time  we  be 
inclined  to  despair  amid  the  waves  of  misfortune  and 
the  malice  of  our  fellow-men  ; — if  weary  of  injustice  and 


The  Example  of  the  Saints. 


199 


discouragement,  we  sometimes  feel  almost  driven  to  say 
■with  Elijah,  "And  now,  0  Lord,  take  away  my  life, 
for  I  am  not  better  than  my  fathers,"  is  there  no  com- 
fort in  the  thought  that  God  is  not  unjust  and  con- 
temptuous like  man  ?  Our  earthly  failure  or  lowliness ; 
the  poverty  of  our  intellectual  gifts  ;  our  failing  efforts ; 
our  waning  powers  ;  our  many  feeblenesses  and  imper- 
fections, so  they  be  not  stained  with  wilful  sin — do  not 
make  us  any  lower  in  the  sight  of  God.  In  spite  of  all 
such  thinga  we  may  have  attained  by  His  grace,  the 
highest  and  best  that  life  has  to  offer.  Even  the  Church 
has  given  her  title  of  "  Saint,"  not  only  to  great  Popes 
like  Anastasius  and  Gregory  ;  and  great  Kings  like  the 
Confessor  and  St.  Louis  ;  and  princely  Bishops  like  St. 
Ambrose  or  St.  Carlo  Borromeo  ; — but  to  some  of  the 
very  humblest  of  the  low.  Can  you  imagine  a  lowlier 
lot  than  that  of  a  servant  of  all-work  ?  Yet  such,  and 
no  more,  was  Santa  Zita.  At  the  age  of  twelve  she  left 
her  little  mountain  village  to  become  a  servant  to  a 
family  in  Lucca,  and  in  that  poor  service  she  continued 
till,  at  the  age  of  sixty,  she  died.  Often  reviled,  often 
beaten,  often  forced  to  hard  menial  duties,  without  one 
murmur  she  served  in  singleness  of  heart,  and  out  of  her 
poverty  she  fed  the  hungry  and  clothed  the  naked  with 
a  garment.  And  yet,  even  in  such  a  lot,  men  saw  her 
happiness  and  her  sainthood  ;  and  thirty  years  after  her 
death,  Dante,  the  greatest  of  Christian  poets,  speaks  of 
a  burgher  of  the  proud  and  warlike  city  of  Lucca, 
simply  as  "one  of  Santa  Zita's  elders."  The  warriors, 
the  bishops,  the  nobles,  all  the  rich,  the  well-to-do,  the 
prosperous,  the  successful,  are  designated  only  as  fellow- 
citizens  with  the  servant  of  all- work.    What  more  would 


200        The  Example  of  the  Saints. 

we  have,  my  brethren,  if  even  through  so  deep  a  valley 
of  humiliation  there  still  lies  the  path  to  heaven  ?  Let 
us  set  our  affection  on  things  above,  not  on  things  on 
the  earth  ;  for,  you  see,  a  life  spent  in  brushing  clothes 
and  washing  crockery  and  sweeping  floors — a  life  which 
the  proud  of  earth  would  have  treated  as  the  dust  under 
their  feet — a  life  spent  at  the  clerk's  desk,  a  life  spent 
in  the  narrow  shop,  a  life  spent  in  the  laborer's  hut — a 
life  of  poverty,  a  life  of  struggle,  a  life  of  obscurity  and 
unsucoess — may  yet  be  a  life  so  ennobled  by  God's  lov- 
ing mercy,  that  for  the  sake  of  it  a  king  might  gladly 
yield  his  crown.  True  kingliness  may  belong  to  any 
one  of  us,  and  even  a  pauper  may  have  it  in  his  power 
to  say,  "  My  crown  is  in  my  heart,  not  on  my  head  ; 
not  set  with  diamonds  and  Indian  stones,  nor  to  be  seen  ; 
my  crown  is  called  '  content ; '  a  crown  it  is  which  sel- 
dom kings  enjoy." 

9.  And  in  conclusion,  thank  God  there  have  been, 
and  are  in  the  earth,  tens  of  thousands,  holy  and  faith- 
fnl,  and  therefore  essentially  happy  and  full  of  inward 
peace,  like  that  poor  servant-girl.  "After  this  I  be- 
held, and  lo !  a  great  multitude  which  no  man  could 
number,  of  all  nations,  and  kindred,  and  people,  and 
tongues,  stood  before  the  throne,  arrayed  with  white 
robes  and  palms  in  their  hands."  Oh  !  when  you  hear 
those  words  set  to  mighty  music,  will  you  not  think  of 
their  solemn  and  glorious  meaning  ?  Will  you  be  of 
that  great  innumerable  multitude  of  the  redeemed  ? 
Amid  the  great  procession  of  humanity,  will  you  make 
np  your  minds  that  you  will  be  poor  or  rich,  low  or  high, 
successful  or  unsuccessful,  as  God  shall  please  ;  but  that 
you  will  not  be  of  the  bad  men  and  bad  women,  who  by 


The  Example  of  the  Saints.  201 


dwarfish  aims,  and  mean  passions,  and  vile  lusts,  and 
acrid  tempers,  and  lying  words,  have  made  the  world 
worse,  and  life  darker,  for  tlieir  fellow-men  ?  Are  you 
at  this  moment  among  those  bad  men  and  bad  women, 
those  mean,  selfish,  and  wicked  natures  ?  Are  you  so 
utterly  on  the  wrong  side  now  ?  And  if  so,  what  will 
ye  do  in  the  end  thereof  ?  If  you  do  not  care  for  your 
soul,  who  will  ?  If  not  now,  when  ?  Ah  !  leave  even 
now  the  baseness  of  the  malicious,  the  greed  of  the 
worldly,  the  shame  of  the  unclean,  and  be  blessed 
for  evermore.  "  And  one  of  the  elders  answered,  saying 
unto  me,  *  What  are  these  which  are  arrayed  in  white 
robes  ?  and  whence  came  they  ?  '  And  I  said  unto  him, 
'Sir,  thou  knowest.'  And  he  said  to  me,  '  These  are 
they  which  came  out  of  great  tribulation,  and  have 
washed  their  robes,  and  made  them  white  in  the  blood 
of  the  Lamb  ;  therefore  are  they  before  the  throne  of 
God,  and  serve  Him  day  and  night,  and  He  that  sitteth 
on  the  throne  shall  dwell  among  them.  They  shall 
hunger  no  more,  neither  thirst  any  more  ;  neither  shall 
the  sun  light  on  them  nor  any  heat,  for  the  Lamb 
which  is  in  the  midst  of  the  throne  shall  feed  them,  and 
shall  lead  them  unto  the  living  fountains  of  waters,  and 
God  shall  wipe  away  all  tears  from  their  eyes.'  " 


SEKMON  XIII. 


Peeacheu  in  Appleton  Chapel,  Harvard  College, 
Cambridge,  Mass.,  Nov.  1,  1885. 


Cl^e  motk  of  ti^e  f  etj)  anu  of  tlfte 


"  By  faith."— Heb.  xi.  4. 

The  history  of  mankind,  whether  secular  or  religions, 
resolves  itself  ultimately  into  the  history  of  a  few  indi- 
viduals. It  is  not  that  all  the  rest  do  not  live  their  own 
lives  or  can  shirk  their  own  eternal  responsibilities,  but  it 
is  that  the  march  and  movement  of  the  many  is  as  surely 
influenced  by  the  genius  of  the  few,  as  is  the  swing  of 
the  tide  by  the  law  of  gravitation.  There  is,  of  course, 
action  and  reaction.  The  thoughts  of  the  many  are  the 
spirit  of  the  age  ;  and  the  spirit  of  the  age  sways  the  in- 
dividual, just  as  the  individual  directs  and  shapes  the 
spirit  of  the  age.  Meanwhile  what  we  see  is  this.  In 
millions  upon  millions  the  races  and  generations  of  man- 
kind are  born  and  die;  the  hurrying  feet  of  new  millions 
tread  them  down  ;  their  dust  is  blown  about  the  desert, 
or  sealed  in  the  iron  hills.  Before  they  have  been  dead 
ten  years  the  vast  majority  of  mankind  are  totally  for- 
gotten.   As  surely  as  the  moss  and  the  lichen  eat  away 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  203 


their  names  upon  the  church-yard  stone,  so  surely  does 
the  ever-rising  tide  of  oblivion  wash  out  our  names  upon 
the  sands  of  life.  It  is  a  law  of  our  being  that  we  should 
belong — the  vast  majority  of  us — to  the  unknown,  the 
unrecorded  masses,  who,  long  before  the  very  things  we 
own  have  perished,  shall  have  passed  away  out  of  all  re- 
membrance, as  utterly  as  though  we  had  never  been. 
One  epitaph  would  do  for  all  of  us,  except  two  or  three 
out  of  every  million. 

"  He  sirffiered, — but  his  pangs  are  o'er; 
Enjoyed, — but  his  delights  are  fled ; 
Had  friends, — his  friends  are  now  no  more. 
And  foes, — his  foes  are  dead. 
****** 

The  annals  of  the  human  race. 

Their  ruins,  since  the  world  began 
Of  him  afford  no  other  trace 

Than  this; — there  lived  a  man!' 

1.  There,  then,  is  one  great  fact  of  human  life ;  an- 
other, and  a  far  sadder  one,  is  tliat,  by  a  sort  of  fatal 
gravitation,  the  human  race  seems  of  itself  to  tend  down- 
ward. The  old  Greek  proverb  said — if  in  one  aspect  it 
be  false,  in  another  (as  our  own  hearts  tell  us)  it  is  ter- 
ribly true — that  "the  majority  are  evil."  We  are  creat- 
ures of  habit,  of  influence,  of  custom  ;  our  voices  are  for 
the  most  part  the  merest  echoes,  our  light  is  but  the 
dim  remnant  of  multitudinous  reflections.  It  is  impulse, 
passion,  temptation,  more  than  reason,  that  often  sways 
the  heart  of  each  man,  and  therefore  of  all  men.  It 
is  the  few  only  who  are  saints,  the  few  only  who  are 
heroes. 

The  persistent  energy  of  selfishness,  the  unbridled 


204  The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

force  of  appetite,  the  craying  for  drink,  the  greed  of 
gain,  the  lust  of  power — these  have  been  the  mighty 
engines  in  the  hands  of  the  world-rulers  of  this  dark- 
ness. What  a  sad  spectacle  does  this  world  present ! 
How  deep,  heart-rending,  is  the  sigh  it  utters  !  How 
deep  would  be  its  corruption,  how  total  its  ruin,  how 
irremediable  its  woe,  if  God's  love  were  not  incessantly 
at  work, — healing  the  ravages  of  pride  and  sensuality, 
saving  His  wandered  sheep,  welcoming  back  His  weary 
prodigals  !  "Half  serpent,  not  yet  extricated  from  the 
clay — a  lacertian  brood  of  bitterness — the  glory  of  it 
emaciated  with  cruel  hunger  and  blotted  with  venomous 
stains,  and  the  track  of  it  on  the  leaf  a  glittering  slime, 
in  the  sand  a  useless  furrow."  Such  would  be  the  race 
of  man  were  there  no  Promised  Seed  to  bruise  the  Ser- 
pent's head. 

2.  And  how  does  God  carry  out  this  work  of  continu- 
ous redemption?  It  is  by  the  energy  of  His  chosen  few. 
Into  their  hearts  He  pours  the  power  of  His  Spirit ; 
upon  their  heads  He  lays  the  hands  of  His  consecration. 
The  history  of  mankind  is  like  the  history  of  Israel  in 
the  days  of  the  Judges.  Again  and  again  the  people 
sank  into  godlessness,  and  into  consequent  degradation; 
again  and  again  a  Deborah,  a  Gideon,  a  Jephtha  delivers 
them.  Tlie  deliverance  of  man  has  never  been  wrought 
by  the  multitude  ;  always  by  the  individual.  The  hope 
of  the  world  is  in  those  rarer  souls  which,  becoming 
themselves  magnetic  with  knowledge  or  with  nobleness, 
flash  into  the  deathful  sloth  or  deep  corruption  of  their 
age  and  nation  the  force  of  their  own  convictions,  the 
passion  of  their  own  resolves. 

3.  Observe  how  completely  this  is  the  case,  even  in  all 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  205 

secular  advance.  All  art,  all  knowledge,  all  discovery 
has,  as  a  rule,  come  from  the  few.  A  child.  Homer,  a 
child,  Alcaeus,  is  born  in  the  Isles  of  Greece,  and  lo  ! 
epic  and  lyric  poetry  burst  into  flower.  A  child,  Thales, 
is  born  at  Miletus,  and  the  world  sees  the  dawn  of 
Greek  philosophy.  A  boy,  Giotto,  is  seen  drawing  his 
sheep  on  a  blue  slate  on  the  hills  of  Florence,  and  lo ! 
Italian  art  springs  into  full  life.  A  boy,  Galileo,  watches 
the  swinging  of  the  great  bronze  lamp  in  the  Cathedral 
of  Pisa,  and  lo  !  the  heavens  became  luminous  with  un- 
utterable secrets.  A  boy,  Watt,  watches  the  steam  con- 
densed on  the  bowl  of  a  silver  spoon,  and  lo  !  in  a  gen- 
eration the  world  is  ploughed  with  railroads  and  the 
ocean  gleams  in  the  white  wake  of  merchantmen  and 
iron-clads.  The  history  of  art  and  science  and  literature 
is  summed  up,  severally,  in  a  score  of  names. 

4.  But  art  and  science  and  literature  would  have  led 
only  to  a  more  sjDlendid  misery  and  a  more  refined  de- 
cay, if  God  did  not  also  send  His  inspired  children  to 
expand  the  thoughts,  to  purify  the  aims,  to  dilate 
the  aspirations  of  mankind.  Of  what  use  would  be 
these  spangles  on  the  funeral  pall  of  a  dying  race  if 
death  ended  all  ?  Your  material  civilization,  your  in- 
dustrial greatness,  your  commercial  prosperity,  your 
accumulating  wealth — "  labor,  vocal  on  every  hill-side, 
and  commerce,  white  on  every  sea  " — of  what  value  are 
they  to  any  race  without  righteousness  ?  Without  moral 
nobleness  how  are  they  better  than  a  jewel  of  gold  in  a 
swine's  snout,  or  a  diamond  on  the  forehead  of  a  skull  ? 
It  is  not  civilization,  it  is  not  knowledge,  it  is  not  even 
intellect  which  has  ever  saved  mankind.  The  true  uplift- 
ing and  redeeming  force  has  been  the  moral  genius  of 


2o6  The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

God's  elect.  Greece,  for  all  her  poetry,  all  her  philosophy, 
and  all  her  charm  ;  Rome,  for  all  her  imperial  strength  ; 
Italy,  for  all  her  intense  sensibility  and  matchless  art, 
sank  in  turn  into  the  abyss  of  degradation,  and  perished 
by  her  own  sins.  So  will  England,  so  will  America,  so 
will  every  nation  perish  if  she  refuse  the  messages  of 
God.  The  hope  of  the  world  lies  in  the  recognition  of, 
in  obedience  to  the  Word  of  God  as  uttered  by  His 
special  messengers  ;  and  by  so  listening  thereto  as  to  re- 
flect in  myriads  of  gleams  and  reverberate  in  myriads  of 
echoes,  the  light  and  the  voice  of  inspiration.  "It  is 
not  mere  learning  which  teaches,"  says  one  of  the 
greatest  of  ancient  philosophers,  "  but  the  Sibyl " — 
that  is,  the  voice  of  heavenly  inspiration — "uttering, 
in  rapt  speech,  things  simple  and  unperfumed  and  un- 
adorned, penetrates  through  myriads  of  years  by  the 
help  of  God. "  The  meaning  is  the  same  as  that  of  a 
poet  of  your  own  when  he  sings  : 

"  One  accent  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
The  heedless  world  had  never  lost." 

Now  I  fear  that  in  this  age  we  must  say  with  the 
Hebrew  Psalmist :  "We  see  not  our  tokens;  there  is  not 
one  prophet  more  ;  "  but  since  the  echoes  of  the  past  are 
not  spent,  it  will  be  the  fault  of  every  one  of  us  if  we 
have  to  add,  "No,  not  one  is  there  among  us  that 
understandeth  any  more. "  For  the  past  teaches  us  how 
awful  is  the  responsibility,  how  tremendous  is  the  power 
of  faith  ;  the  need  for  faitb  is  never  more  tremendous 
than  in  conventional,  unheroic,  sensual  days.  What 
then  are  we  to  do  ?  Perhaps  if  you  will  take  a  swift 
glance  with  me  at  the  moral  history  of  the  world;  if  we 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  207 

consider,  for  a  moment  or  two,  the  days  of  old  and  the 
years  of  ancient  times,  some  light  may  dawn  upon  us, 
some  touch  of  shame  may  pass  into  vulgar,  some  sense 
of  duty  into  selfish,  some  spark  of  brighter  arrows  into 
generous  hearts. 

5.  Adam  fell ;  his  children  sank  deeper  and  deeper 
into  sin  ;  lust  and  violence  became  universal  ;  the  world 
groaned  under  colossal  tyrannies  ;  the  warnings  of  Noah 
were  in  vain  ;  the  waters  of  the  deluge  were  needed  for 
the  lustration  of  mankind.  Scarcely  had  those  waters 
ebbed,  when  drunkenness  and  degradation,  wrong  and 
robbery,  resumed  their  sway.  Then  amid  the  gross 
idolatry  of  the  nations  God  called  forth  one  chosen  soul, 
Abraham,  the  father  of  the  faithful.  His  sons  went 
into  Egypt.  There,  in  the  sluggish  valley  of  the  Nile, 
among  the  flesh  pots  and  the  cucumbers,  they  sank  into 
a  horde  of  sensual  slaves.  Then  out  of  Egypt  God  called 
His  Son.  He  raised  up  a  man  among  the  quailing  serfs. 
Brought  up  in  the  palaces  of  Egypt,  Moses,  refusing  to 
be  called  the  son  of  Pharaoh's  daughter,  threw  in  his 
lot  with  the  oppressed.  He  recalled  to  them  the  for- 
gotten God  of  their  fathers  ;  led  them  into  the  free  air 
of  the  wilderness  ;  gave  them  at  Sinai  a  moral  law,  on 
which,  as  on  the  primeval  granite,  are  built  the  eternal 
rules  of  right  and  wrong.  He  died ;  his  people  went 
a  whoring  after  Chemosh,  and  Moloch,  and  Baal-Peor  ; 
the  Judges  wrought  no  permanent  deliverance  ;  the 
very  priests  filled  the  house  of  God  with  insolence  and 
shame.  Then  God  called  the  boy  Samuel,  and  he  heard, 
and  founded  the  great  order  of  the  Prophets — the  moral 
teachers  of  Israel  and  of  the  race.  For  seven  centuries, 
among  corrupt  priests  and  apostate  kings,  that  order 


2o8  The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

was  the  main  hope  of  the  Hebrew  people.  Now  an 
Elijah,  with  flame  and  thunder,  startled  them  out  of 
idolatrous  abominations ;  now  an  Isaiah  nerved  the 
palsied  arms  of  their  patriots  ;  now  an  Ezekiel  from 
Chaldea,  a  Jeremiah  from  Anathoth,  poured  forth,  as 
in  strophe  and  antistrophe,  the  truths  of  God.  Then 
came  the  Captivity.  In  ruin  Israel  learned  righteous- 
ness. Ezra  revived  the  Law  of  Moses.  But  as  the 
generations  passed,  the  Jews  lapsed  more  and  more  from 
the  idolatry  of  the  material  to  the  fetish  worship  of  the 
external.  Faith  dwindled  into  Pharisaism,  morality 
into  compromise,  and  all  hope  seemed  dead,  when, 
in  the  blight  of  holiness  and  the  triumph  of  ritual, 
the  popular  orthodoxy  was  no  better  than  a  heresy,  and 
the  popular  religionism  no  more  wholesome  than  a 
vice. 

6.  But  then,  in  the  fulness  of  time,  when  the  re- 
generating impulses  of  the  old  dispensation  seemed  ut- 
terly to  have  lost  their  force  to  bring  home  to  mankind, 
once  more  and  forever,  the  knowledge  and  will  of  God  ; 
to  prove  forever  the  nullity  of  the  external ;  to  reveal 
forever  that  God  is  love  ;  to  show  forever  that  the  will 
of  God  is  not  outward  observances,  but  inward  sanc- 
tification  ;  to  open  forever  to  every  human  soul  imme- 
diate access  to  God  without  any  usurping  intervention 
of  human  sacerdotalism  ;  to  set  forever  the  example  of 
how  men  ought  to  walk ;  and  to  please  God,  to  take 
away  sin  once  for  all  by  the  offering  of  Himself,  at 
the  mid-point  of  all  human  history,  Christ  came.  He 
came  to  be  the  Light  of  the  world.  From  the  sunlike 
centrality  of  His  incarnate  Godhead  He  shed  His  rays 
of  illumination  into  all  the  past ;  to  its  most  illimitable 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  209 

marge  He  flooded  all  the  future  with  the  glory  of  His 
effulgent  fire. 

7.  So  the  old  ended  ;  so  began  the  new.  Christ  died 
upon  the  cross  ;  He  rose  again  ;  He  bade  the  Apostles 
be  His  witnesses.  Three  centuries  passed ;  in  the 
misery  of  decaying  institutions,  men  were  sinking  into 
moral  death.  Then  St.  Antony,  forsaking  all,  made 
his  home  in  the  lonely  deserts,  to  convince  his  genera- 
tion of  the  infinite  valne  of  every  human  soul.  Two 
more  centuries  passed,  and  about  a.d.  500  St.  Bene- 
dict, amid  the  roar  of  political  confusion,  founded,  on 
the  principles  of  toil  and  prayer,  the  noble  monastic 
order  to  which  civilization  owes  so  deep  a  debt.  Five 
centuries  passed,  and  in  1073,  in  an  age  of  pride  and 
violence,  Gregory  VII.  maintained  the  supremacy  of 
the  spiritual  power  over  threats  and  arms.  Another 
century  passed  ;  the  Church  had  everywhere  triumphed, 
and  in  her  triumph  had  lost  the  sacredness  of  her 
simple  sincerity.  Then,  about  a.d.  1200,  amid  the 
universal  lust  of  power  and  gold,  St.  Francis  of  Assisi 
made  Poverty  his  bride,  and  St.  Dominic  revived  the 
dormant  forces  of  the  Christian  pulpit.  Again  three 
centuries  passed,  and  soon  after  the  year  1500,  and  amid 
a  Church  steeped  to  the  lips  in  sacerdotal  greed  and 
moral  pollution,  the  lion  voice  of  Luther  shook  the 
world. 

8.  There  have  been  multitudes  of  other,  and  multi- 
tudes of  minor  movements.  I  might  have  told  how,  in 
the  fourth  century,  Athanasius  all  but  single-handed, 
maintained  the  true  faith  against  a  persecuting  impe- 
rialism and  an  apostatizing  world  ;  how  amid  a  dissolv- 
ing empire,  St.  Augustine  familiarized  men  with  the 

14 


2IO  The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

grand  conception  of  the  City  of  God  ;  how  amid  furious 
barbarians,  St.  Columban  witnessed,  and  St.  Boniface 
preached.  But  such,  in  broad,  vast  outline  has  been 
the  religious  history  of  the  world.  Apart  from  the  Sun 
of  Righteousness,  it  is  all  darkness.  Apart  from  His 
spirit,  it  is  all  deatli.  In  the  names  of  Abraham,  Moses, 
Samuel,  Ezra — all  pointing  to  Christ  ;  in  the  names 
of  Antony,  Benedict,  Gregory,  Francis,  Luther — all 
charged  with  His  divine  magnetism,  all  radiating  His 
glory,  all  teaching  some  fragment  of  His  truth,  and 
carrying  out  some  element  of  His  example — we  may  sum 
up  the  mightiest  of  those  religious  forces  which  have 
swept  over  the  stagnation  of  mankind.  Have  we 
nothing  to  learn  from  this  method  of  God's  working, 
from  this  sweeping  summary  of  the  Old  Testament,  and 
of  Christian  history  ?  I  think  that  we  may  learn  one  or 
two  lessons  of  deep  significance. 

i.  May  we  not  learn  first  the  secret,  the  sole  secret, 
of  moral  power  ?  Who  that  reads  the  signs  of  these 
times  can  fail  to  see  how  much  this  age  needs  to  learn 
that  secret  ?  What  was  it  which  thus,  again  and  again, 
overcame  the  world  ?  Was  it  not  faith,  showing  itself 
in  self-sacrifice  ?  Is  not  that  secret  open  to  the  knowl- 
edge, feasible  to  the  practice,  of  you  and  me,  and  all  the 
world?  "Whoever,"  said  St.  Columban,  "overcomes 
himself,  treads  the  world  underfoot."  By  faith  Abra- 
ham left  the  home  of  his  fathers.  By  faith  Moses 
preferred  to  suffer  affliction  with  the  people  of  God. 
By  faith  Samuel  founded  the  order  of  the  Prophets. 
By  faith  Elijah  faced  idolatrous  priests  and  guilty 
kings.  By  faith  Ezra  led  back  his  people  to  barren 
Judah  from  wealthy  Babylon.    By  faith  Antony  forsook 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  211 

the  world.  By  faith  Athanasius  maintained  the  Chris- 
tian verity.  By  faith  Benedict,  even  yet  a  boy,  rolled 
his  naked  body  in  the  briers  to  conquer  sensual  tempta- 
tion. By  faith  Gregory  cowed  the  brutality  of  feudal- 
ism. By  faith,  on  the  wild  hills  of  TJmbria,  Francis  of 
Assisi  imitated  the  life  of  Christ.  By  faith  Luther 
burnt  the  Pope's  bull  at  Wittenberg,  and  faced  the 
Emperor's  council  at  Worms.  And  thus,  their  faith, 
proving  itself  by  absolute  self- surrender,  by  unswerving 
obedience,  by  unbounded  activity,  by  dauntless  courage, 
by  hatred  of  falsehood,  by  scorn  of  luxury,  by  pouring 
silent  contempt  on  the  base  idolatry  of  gold — each 
in  his  age  and  order  these  saints  of  God  delivered  his 
generation,  inspired  his  successors,  wrought  righteous- 
ness in  a  faithless  world. 

ii.  And  I  think  we  may  notice  secondly  that  the  work 
of  these  saints  of  God,  being  always  and  necessarily 
human,  is  never  permanent  in  its  special  results.  You 
may  place  the  lamp  upon  its  stand  ;  you  may  fill  it  with 
fragrant  oil ;  but,  unless  the  oil  be  perpetually  re- 
newed, it  will  soon  go  out  in  sickening  fume,  and  leave 
the  world  in  darkness.  Why  ?  Because  God  not  only 
requires  man's  eliort,  but  also  his  continuous  efforts. 
In  this  rushing  stream  of  time — the  smoothness  of  the 
rapid  ere  it  leaps  in  cataract — humanity  can  never  afford 
for  a  moment  to  rest  upon  its  oars.  There  is  an  infinite 
pathos  in  the  predestined  failure  of  men  and  institutions 
which  leave  no  adequate  heirs  to  propagate  their  im- 
pulse, to  carry  on  their  purposes.  Abraham  dies,  and 
in  a  century  his  descendants  are  slaves.  Moses  dies, 
and  his  grandson,  Jonathan,  is  the  hireling  Levite  of 
an  idolatrous  ephod.     Samuel  dies,  and  his  very  sons 


212  The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

are  greedy  oppressors.  Ezra  dies,  and  Pharisaism  be- 
gins. The  Lord  of  life  and  glory  dies,  and,  before  that 
generation  has  passed  away,  His  Church  is  full  of 
grievous  wolves.  The  successors  of  St.  Antony  become 
a  herd  of  ignorant  fanatics  ;  the  successors  of  St. 
Benedict  dwindle  into  luxurious  hypocrites  ;  the  succes- 
sors of  St,  Francis  into  idle  mendicants  ;  the  successors 
of  St.  Dominic  into  ruthless  inquisitors  ;  the  successors 
of  Luther  into  sectarian  dogmatists.  When  the  influ- 
ence of  God's  saints  has  spent  its  force,  if  the  work 
pauses  for  a  moment,  everything  falls  into  ruin  and 
corruption.  Christianity  as  a  stereotyped  system  is 
nothing;  Christianity  as  a  human  theology  is  nothing ; 
only  as  a  divine  effort ;  only  as  an  eternal  progress  ; 
only  as  a  living  force  ;  only  as  an  inspiring,  passionate, 
continuous  energy  can  it  regenerate  the  world. 

iii.  But  yet  notice,  thirdly,  that  these  apparent 
failures  were  never  absolute.  No  good  man,  no  saint 
of  God,  has  ever  lived  or  died  in  vain.  They  have  died, 
almost  always,  in  loneliness,  or  disappointment,  or  at 
the  stake,  or  in  the  prison,  or  with  hearts  broken  by 
man's  ingratitude — so  often  that  something  seems  want- 
ing to  the  holiest  careers  which  have  not  ended,  even 
as  Christ's  did,  each  in  its  own  Calvary  ;  but  they  have 
never  ended  in  vain.  No  !  for  the  seed  is  not  quickened 
except  it  dies.  Even  in  its  death,  but  only  by  its  death, 
comes  the  promise  of  the  golden  grain.  St.  Telemachus 
was  butchered  in  the  arena,  but  because  of  his  death 
there  was  an  end  to  gladiatorial  games.  "  I  have  loved 
righteousness,"  said  Gregory  VII.,  "  and  hated  iniquity, 
and  therefore  I  die  in  exile  ; "  yet  his  life  has  estab- 
lished the  supremacy  of  righteousness  over  brute  force. 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  213 

Huss  was  burnt,  but  Luther  rose.  Latimer  and  Ridley 
were  burnt ;  but  they  lit  such  a  candle  in  England  as 
by  God's  grace  is  not  yet  put  out.  As  for  themselves, 
what  matters  it  ?  "  Heaven  is  for  those  who  have  failed 
on  earth."  The  saintly  life  even  when  the  world  has 
scoffed  at  it  most  bitterly  and  crushed  it  most  utterly, 
has  still  been  the  saintly  life.  "  We  fools  accounted 
their  lives  madness  and  their  end  to  be  without  honor  j 
how  are  they  set  among  the  children  of  God,  and  their 
lot  among  the  saints ! "  And  even  when  the  effort 
against  drunkenness,  and  vice,  and  Pharisaism,  and 
wrong  has  failed,  there  has  still  been  the  effort,  and  the 
world  is  better  for  it.  The  very  best  of  us  leaves  his 
tale  half  untold,  his  message  imperfect ;  but  if  we  have 
but  been  faithful,  then,  because  of  us,  some  one  who 
follows  us,  with  a  happier  heart  and  in  happier  times, 
shall  utter  our  message  better  and  tell  our  tale  more 
perfectly.  Some  one  shall  run  and  not  be  faint ;  some 
one  shall  fly  with  wings  where  we  have  walked  with 
weary  feet ! 

iv.  I  think  we  may  sum  up  in  a  few  words  the  prac- 
tical issue  of  these  thoughts.  Magnificent  have  been 
man's  victories  over  the  material  world.  He  has  weighed 
the  stars ;  he  has  tunnelled  the  mountains  ;  he  has  cleft 
the  seas  ;  he  has  seized  the  lightnings  by  their  wing  of 
fire,  and  bade  them  do  his  messages.  But  when  we 
turn  from  the  material  to  the  spiritual  world — to  that 
world  in  which  love,  and  duty,  and  death  are  ruling 
forces — there,  as  has  been  well  said,  all  is  changed. 
There  we  have  the  mistakes  of  the  good  and  the  errors 
of  the  wise.  There  we  have  indeed  all  that  is  noblest 
and  most  beautiful  in  man,  all  that  is  brightest  and 


2  14         Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

most  pathetic  in  his  fate  ;  but  we  have  also  "his  mul- 
tiplied failures,  his  average  moral  poverty,  his  pro- 
foundest  moral  ruin,"  Are  we  then  to  sit  with  folded 
hands,  idle  and  helpless,  because  good  men  die  and  leave 
no  successors  ?  and  because  good  institutions  fail,  or, 
like  the  too  long-gathered  manna,  begin  at  last  to 
corrupt  the  world  ?  Are  we  to  hide  our  talent  in  a 
napkin,  because  it  is  but  one  talent,  and  all  the  world 
combines  to  tell  us  how  poor  and  small  it  is  ?  Are 
we  to  clutch  what  we  can,  with  grasping  self-indul- 
gence in  a  greedy  world  ?  Ah  !  my  brethren,  that — the 
life  of  worldly  avarice,  sleek  comfort,  sensual  ease, 
restless  ambition — as  it  is  the  commonest,  so  it  is  the 
worst  of  all  failures.  Nay  !  what  we  have  to  do  is 
simply  to  work  ;  not  to  conquer, — that  we  cannot  do  ; 
not  to  succeed, — that  we  cannot  do  any  more  than  our 
fathers  ;  not  to  be  happy, — that  in  the  world's  sense,  no 
true  man  has  ever  been  ;  not  to  make  our  mark,  or 
leave  our  memory, — that  is  of  no  sort  of  consequence  ; 
but  simply  to  work  between  the  narrow  limits  of  life  and 
death  ;  to  work  humbly,  to  work  in  faith.  "Fear,  and 
indolence,  and  impatience,  and  despondency  " — shall  we 
listen  to  these  base  and  trembling  counsellors  ?  No ;  in 
what  seems  to  be  the  most  irretrievable  disaster,  a  vision 
of  the  cross  may  show  us  that  seeming  failure  is  often 
the  necessary  step  to  the  most  eternal  triumph. 

"  It  sounds  so  lovely  what  our  fathers  did, 
*  *  *  * 

And  what  we  do  is,  as  it  was  to  them, 
Toilsome  and  incomplete." 

Toilsome  !  but  faith  can  lighten  ;  incomplete,  but 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  2 1 5 

God  will  finish  it.  Do  not  think  that  I  have  preached 
some  stormy  gospel  of  hero-worship,  as  though  the 
few  saints  were  everything,  and  we,  the  masses  and 
the  multitudes,  are  nothing.  God's  work  is  carried  on 
by  their  work  on  us.  They  live,  they  work,  they  are 
blessed  by  the  effects  they  are  permitted  to  achieve  in 
us.  And  remember  there  are,  thank  God,  myriads  of 
saints  which  the  world  never  heard  of.  Their  names 
are  in  no  calendar ;  their  graves  are  never  visited  ;  no 
lamp  is  kindled  at  their  shrines  ;  yet,  in  the  midst  of  all 
this  sin  and  sorrow,  has  God,  in  every  society,  pre- 
served him  His  seven  thousand  who  have  not  bowed  the 
knee  to  Baal,  and  every  mouth  that  hath  not  kissed  him. 
Strive  we  to  be  of  these,  the  faithful  who  were  not 
famous  ;  and  then  our  lives,  however  insignificant,  will 
not  have  been  in  vain.  Each  grain  of  mica  helps  to 
build  the  mountain  bastions  ;  each  coral  insect  has  had 
his  share  in  laying  the  bases  of  the  continents  ;  each 
drop  in  the  rain-shower  helps  to  fertilize  the  soil ;  each 
grain  of  sand  upon  the  shore  is  taken  up  upon 
the  wings  of  the  wind  to  do  its  part  as  a  barrier 
against  the  raging  of  the  sea.  If  in  life  we  can  neither 
be  saints  nor  heroes,  yet  we  can  delight  in  these  and  help 
them  in  carrying  on  God's  work ;  the  work  of  the  very 
humblest  among  us  may  be  necessary  to  make  it  clearer 
to  all  that  come  after  us  that  "  man  was  created  for 
holiness  as  the  trees  of  the  forest  for  light;"  that  good 
and  not  evil  is,  and  is  to  be,  the  law  of  our  being  ;  and 
that,  if  the  course  of  all  mankind  as  it  sweeps  across  the 
universe  from  the  great  deep  of  nothing  to  the  great 
deep  of  death,  be  a  course  from  mystery  to  mystery,  it 
is  also  a  course  from  God  to  God. 


2 1 6  The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

And,  therefore,  to  you,  the  students  of  Harvard,  the 
voice  of  a  stranger  would  fain  speak  the  words  of  hope,  of 
encouragement,  of  inspiration.  Have  you  faith  ?  Can 
you,  without  a  pang,  sacrifice  pleasure  to  duty,  the 
present  to  the  future,  the  near  to  the  distant,  the  world 
and  all  its  interests  for  the  cross  and  the  reward  of 
Christ  ?  If  you  have  such  faith,  were  it  but  as  a  grain 
of  mustard  seed,  you  shall  remove  mountains.  So  did 
your  fathers.  It  was  faith  which  hung  the  lantern  on 
the  prow  of  Columbus  as  he  crossed  the  stormy,  terrible, 
unknown  main.  It  was  by  faith  that  Captain  John 
Smith  "made  justice  in  all  his  proceedings  his  first 
guide,  and  experience  his  second,  combating  baseness, 
sloth,  and  pride  more  than  all  other  dangers."  By  faith 
Bishop  Berkeley  made  his  home  in  a  strange  land.  By 
faith  a  handful  of  outcasts  planting  their  feet  on  Plym- 
outh Eock,  made  it  the  corner-stone  of  a  mighty  king- 
dom. By  faith  William  Penn  founded  the  City  of 
Brotherly  Love.  By  faith  John  Eliot  became  the  Apos- 
tle of  the  Indians.  By  faith  David  Brainerd  wrote  that 
he  not  only  welcomed  but  desired  a  life  of  total  renunci- 
ation. By  faith  Washington  confronted  all  the  imperial 
power  of  Britain.  By  faith  Jefferson  wrote  the  Declara- 
tion of  Independence.  By  faith  Wesley  and  Whitefield 
flashed,  into  this  continent  also,  the  electric  thrill  of 
religious  awakenment.  By  faith  Channing  showed  alike 
the  love  of  wisdom  and  the  wisdom  of  love.  By  faith 
William  Lloyd  Garrison — disowned  by  intellect,  cursed 
by  trade,  searched  by  malignity  with  candles,  frowned 
on  even  by  the  nominal  Church  of  God — rose  up  to 
teach  their  neglected,  their  forgotten  duty,  to  the  cus- 
tom-sophisticated minds  of  twenty  millions  of  his  fel- 


The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many.  2  r  7 

low-countrymen.  By  faith  Abraham  Lincoln  called  for 
a  hundred  thousand  volunteers  that  there  might  never- 
more be  a  slave  in  the  country  of  the  free.  By  faith 
these  wrought  and  fought  and  overcame;  slaying  dragons, 
stopping  the  mouths  of  lions,  quenching  the  violence  of 
fire.  Your  country  needs  a  new  enthusiasm.  To  whom 
but  to  you,  her  young  men,  shall  she  look  to  give  it  her? 
You  are  the  trustees  of  posterity.  On  whom  else  shall 
she  call  to  wake  the  deep  slumber  of  careless  opinions;  to 
startle  the  torpor  of  an  immoral  acquiescence;  to  kindle 
burning  aspirations ;  to  set  noble  examples ;  to  cleanse 
the  Augean  stables  of  politics  and  trade  ;  to  shame  false 
ideals  of  life  ;  to  deepen  the  lessening  sense  of  the  sacred- 
ness  of  marriage ;  to  make  your  Press  nobler  and  less 
frivolous  ;  to  make  the  aims  of  society  more  earnest ;  to 
make  homes  pure ;  to  make  life  simple ;  to  defy  the 
petty  and  arrogant  tyrannies  of  the  thing  which  calls 
itself  public  opinion ;  to  trample  on  the  base  omniijo- 
tence  of  gold  ?  She  calls  to  you  !  Will  you  hear  her 
voice,  or  will  you,  too,  make,  like  the  young  ruler,  the 
great  refusal  ?  Which  do  you  desire — purity  or  corrup- 
tion ?  wealth  or  nobleness  ?  success  or  self-sacrifice  ? 
Which  will  you  do  ? — will  you  be  vulgar,  and  comfort- 
able, and  rich,  and  only  half  honest ;  or  will  you  be 
men,  God's  chosen  by  election,  Grod's  servants  by  benefi- 
cence ?  Will  you  escape  the  average  ?  Will  you  rise 
above  the  moral  commonplace  ?  Will  you  leave  the 
world  a  little  nobler,  a  little  wiser,  a  little  purer,  a  little 
better  for  your  life  ?  or  will  you,  too,  call  evil  good,  and 
good  evil,  put  bitter  for  sweet,  and  sweet  for  bitter  ? 
Will  you,  too,  adopt  current  standards  ?  Will  you  try 
to  serve  God  and  Mammon  ?   Will  you,  trimming  and 


2 1 8  The  Work  of  the  Few  and  of  the  Many. 

shuffling  in  the  wake  of  popularity,  follow  the  giddy  and 
fluttering  rag  of  Acheron,  and  be  of  those  multitudes 
who  die  or  ever  they  have  truly  lived  ? 

If  you  take  the  nobler,  the  manlier  choice,  what  shall 
we  promise,  what  shall  we  offer  you  ?  Wealth  ?  No  ! 
Success  ?  No  !  The  praise  of  men  ?  No  !  But  rather 
persecutions,  oppositions,  the  beatitude  of  malediction. 
Yes  !  but  with  Christ's  hundred-fold  reward.  "  Behold 
I  set  before  you  this  day  life  and  death,  blessing  and 
cursing  :  choose  life."  When  Garibaldi  wanted  volun- 
teers after  his  defeat  at  Eome,  he  made  the  proclama- 
tion :  "  Soldiers,  I  have  nothing  to  offer  you  but  rags, 
and  hardship,  and  cold,  and  hunger.  Let  him  that 
loves  his  country  follow  me."  He  said  it,  and  the  youth 
of  Italy  sprang  to  their  feet  to  embrace  his  cause.  Will 
you  linger  when  Christ  calls  ?  Will  you  decline  be- 
cause He  asks  hard  service  ?  Nay,  in  God's  war  slack- 
ness is  infamy.  "Fight,  fight,  fight," — they  were  the 
dying  words  of  the  holy  and  eloquent  Kavignan — "  fight, 
fight,  fight  in  the  battles  of  the  Lord." 


SERMON  XIV. 


Peeacheu  at  Treott  Chxjech,  Chicago,  Nov.  15,  1885. 


giDealjs  of  i^ationjs. 


"Keep,  therefore,  and  do  them  ;  for  this  is  your  wisdom  and 
your  understanding  in  the  sight  of  the  nations,  which  shall  hear 
all  these  statutes,  and  say,  surely  this  great  nation  is  a  wise  and 
understanding  people. " — Deut.  iv.  6. 

You  will  see  from  .this  verse  that  the  fame  and 
wisdom  of  Israel  are  to  be  tested  solely  by  her  obedience 
to  the  laws  of  God.  For  Israel,  for  England,  for 
America,  for  every  nation  under  the  sun  there  is  no 
other  criterion.  Mankind  has  many  tests;  God  has 
but  one.  If  the  ideal  of  the  nation  be  righteous,  she 
will  be  great  and  strong.  If  the  ideal  of  the  nation  be 
base  or  evil,  she  will  sooner  or  later  perish  in  her  iniq- 
uity, and  become  a  hissing  and  by-word.  That  lesson 
you  can  learn  very  easily  from  Scripture,  for,  though 
modern  religion  has  sometimes  dwindled  into  a  feeble 
rill  of  personal  egotism.  Scripture  deals  even  more  with 
men  in  masses  than  with  men  as  individuals. 

And  the  reason  of  this  is,  that  in  the  history  of  na- 


220 


Ideals  of  Nations, 


I  - 


tions  God  writes  more  at  large  the  meaning  and  the 
secrets  of  His  providence.  In  our  individual  lives  they 
are  written  in  letters  so  much  smaller  that  we  cannot 
always  decipher  them,  and  often  we  have  not  had  time 
to  master  their  meaning  until  it  has  become  too  late 
to  profit  by  them.  But  the  history  of  nations,  though 
it  has  less  immediate  interest  for  our  selfishness,  has 
this  twofold  importance  :  one,  that  every  one  of  us 
individually  contributes  to  the  glory  or  the  shame  of 
the  nation  to  which  we  belong  ;  the  other,  that  if  we 
have  no  power  to  save  our  people  from  walking  in  evil 
paths,  we  can  at  least  do  something  to  elevate  and  re- 
strain them,  and  to  preserve  in  the  midst  of  them  a 
saved  and  saving  remnant  which  is  dear  to  God. 

Let  us,  then,  clearly  and  fully  recognize  that  we 
have  duties,  not  only  as  men,  but  as  citizens.  These 
duties  require  us  to  help  our  nation  to  the  attainment 
of  a  true  ideal.  Is  the  ideal  of  our  people,  as  expressed 
by  its  predominant  aims  and  aspirations,  a  right  or  a 
wrong — is  it  a  noble  or  base  ideal  ?  So  far  as  it  is  a 
wrong  ideal,  can  we  help  to  amend  it  ?  So  far  as  it  is 
a  right  ideal,  can  we  promote  and  further  it  ? 

1.  The  ideal  of  many  nations  has  been  delight  in 
war.  They  have  not  cared  to  have  any  annals  which 
were  not  written  in  blood.  Such  a  people  were  the 
ancient  Assyrians,  of  whom  we  read  so  much  in  Script- 
ure. In  the  sculptures  of  their  kings'  palaces  you  may 
see  how  they  exulted  to  portray  themselves.  Pass  the 
huge  portals,  guarded  by  winged  bulls,  and  lions  with 
human  faces,  and  on  every  wall  you  will  see  delineated 
people  of  frightful  fierceness,  defeating  their  enemies, 
swimming  rivers,  shattering  fortresses,  dashing  cities 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


221 


into  potsherds,  torturing  and  slaughtering  their  pris- 
oners, sweeping  from  land  to  land  like  a  devouring  fire, 
while  over  their  heads  fly  fierce  spirits  who  protect  and 
foster  these  cruelties,  and  eagles  who  carry  in  their 
claws  the  entrails  of  the  slain.  In  the  hall  of  Sargon 
that  king  has  had  himself  represented  stabbing  and 
butchering  his  captives  with  his  own  hands.  In  the 
one  domestic  scene  found  among  these  sculpturings  of 
horror  and  bloodshed  (you  may  see  it  if  you  ever  visit 
the  British  Museum  of  London),  the  son  of  Sennacherib 
is  seated  in  a  vine-clad  arbor  at  a  feast.  Opposite  to 
him  is  his  queen  among  her  maidens,  and  close  behind 
the  queen  hangs  from  the  branch  of  a  palm  tree  a 
ghastly  human  head  with  an  iron  ring  drawn  through 
the  lip.  Such  were  the  awful  ornaments  of  queens' 
chambers  in  days  of  old.  Well,  did  it  prosper,  this 
bloody  city  ?  Did  it  endure,  this  home  of  lions  and  of 
young  lions,  where  the  lion  fed  its  whelps  and  strangled 
for  his  lioness,  and  filled  his  dens  with  raven  ?  Kead 
the  prophet  Nahum  for  answer,  and  you  will  see  how 
soon  it  passed  away  in  fire  and  sword  amid  the  wrath 
and  hatred  of  the  nations.  And  did  war-loving  Egypt 
fare  better  ?  "We  see  her  triumphant  dynasts  sweeping 
into  battle  amid  the  serried  ranks  of  her  numberless 
archers  ;  we  read  pompous  enumeration  of  the  victories 
of  her  Eamises  ;  but  Egypt  snapped  like  one  of  her  own 
river  reeds  before  the  might  of  Persia,  and  the  fella- 
heen scooped  their  millstones  out  of  the  face  of  Kam- 
ises,  the  most  colossal  statue  in  the  world.  We  ask, 
then,  is  the  ideal  of  England,  is  the  ideal  of  America,  a 
war  ideal  ?  Thank  God,  the  two  nations,  which  are 
one  nation,  may  plead  not  guilty  to  that  charge.  War 


222 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


is  not  the  ideal  of  England.  We  look  back  with  no 
vaunting,  but  yet  with  pride,  to  the  names  of  Crecy 
and  Agincourt,  of  Blenheim,  and  Ramilles,  of  Talavera, 
and  Waterloo,  of  Alma  and  Inkerman  ;  but  enough  of 
such  victorious  names,  and  more  than  enough  are  bla- 
zoned upon  our  flags.  We  do  not  drain  our  resources  by 
bloated  armaments.  There  is  no  need  that  we  should 
be  reminded  of  the  horrors,  the  agonies,  the  crimes  of 
war.  The  nation  will  never  draw  her  sword  without 
necessity  ;  never  without  a  deep  reluctance  which  can- 
not impeach  a  tried  courage,  but  which  will  show  a 
just  cause  of  awful  responsibility.  Nor  is  war  the  ideal 
of  America.  You  have  shown  to  the  world  a  striking 
demonstration  that  mighty  nations  can  be  governed  and 
can  be  safe,  and  can  be  formidable  without  standing 
armies.  At  the  wave  of  the  hand  your  host  of  a  million 
men  sprang  to  its  feet  in  the  war  of  North  and  South. 
At  a  wave  of  the  hand,  like  the  men  of  Roderick  Dhu, 
they  sank  out  of  sight.  You  seized  the  sword  in  the 
cause  of  liberty.  You  laid  it  aside  when  that  was  won. 
"The  sword,"  after  all,  "is  but  a  hideous  flash  in  the 
darkness.    Eight  is  an  eternal  ray." 

2.  But  there  has  been  another  ideal  of  nations  :  not 
war,  but  glory ;  not  the  tyranny  and  vengeance  of 
armies,  but  their  pomp  and  fame.  This,  until  she 
learned  wisdom  by  bitterly  humiliating  experience,  way 
the  ideal  of  France.  When  Napoleon  blasted  the  fields 
of  Europe,  as  with  the  blaze  of  some  flaming  heath,  he 
indulged  freely  in  the  empty  vanity  of  dictating  frivo- 
lous orders  about  the  opera  at  Paris,  from  the  palaces  of 
Vienna  and  Berlin.  To  the  impulses  of  a  limitless  am- 
bition he  sacrificed  hundreds  of  thousands  of  lives. 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


223 


"Tyrant,"  said  an  inscription  on  the  famous  column  in 
the  Place  Venddme — that  column  which  was  deemed  so 
glorious  that  Louis  Napoleon  said  it  was  worth  to  him 
more  than  a  hundred  thousand  votes — "Tyrant,  if  the 
hlood  that  you  have  shed  should  be  collected  in  this 
square,  you  might  drink  of  it  without  stooping  your 
lips."  And  what  came  of  that  loud-echoing,  flaming, 
blood-stained  path  of  the  first  Napoleon  ? 

It  left  France  poorer,  feebler,  more  burdened,  more 
wretched  than  before.  It  sapped  the  very  life-blood  of 
the  people,  which  was  poured  forth  like  water  to  feed 
the  laurels  of  fruitless  triumph,  and  yet  France  did  not 
learn  the  lesson.  The  scenes  of  the  Franco-German 
war  are  still  in  our  recollection ;  the  vain  warning  of 
Mexico ;  the  plain  signs  of  a  decrepitude  and  a  disor- 
ganization, which,  by  the  confession  of  her  own  greatest 
men,  were  the  natural  fruits  of  infidelity  and  corrup 
tion ;  the  braggart  throngs  who  swaggered  through  the 
streets  of  Paris  "a  Berlin  ;"  the  exploded  statesman 
who  entered  into  the  war  with  a  light  heart ;  the  the- 
atric, "  not  a  stone  of  our  fortresses ;  not  an  inch  of  our 
territories ;"  the  scenes  at  Strasburg  and  Metz  ;  the  im- 
measurable humiliation  of  Sedan ;  the  reduction  of  the 
exiled  emperor  to  a  despised  broken  idol  ;  the  absolute 
surrender  of  Alsace  and  Lorraine,  all  culminating  the 
other  day  in  the  ignominious  steaming  of  the  French 
fleet  out  of  the  Bay  of  Alexandria.  Alas  !  it  was  an  in- 
finite collapse  of  that  inflated  bubble  of  glory.  Do  we 
say  these  things  by  way  of  boast  over  a  fallen  rival  ? 
God  forbid.  It  is  not  our  temptation  to  say,  "Aha  !" 
in  any  glad  spirit  when  nations  fall  from  high  estate. 
Nay, .  we  pray  with  all  our  hearts,  and  with  perfect 


224 


Ideals  of  Nations, 


friendliness,  that  France  may  spring  from  her  ashes  on 
wings  of  a  better  wisdom,  a  purer  faith.  But  to  this 
false  ideal  again  we  in  England  and  you  in  America  may 
boldly  plead  not  guilty.  That  poor,  delusive  word, 
glory,  occurs  again  and  again  in  the  dispatches  of  Na- 
poleon ;  I  am  not  sure  that  it  occurs  so  much  as  once  in 
the  dispatches  of  Washington  or  of  Wellington.  And 
this  is  what  Wellington  wrote  on  the  eve  of  Waterloo: 
"I  cannot  express  the  regret  and  sorrow  with  which  I 
contemplate  the  heavy^  loss  I  have  sustained.  Believe 
me,  nothing  except  a  battle  lost  is  so  terrible  as  a  battle 
won.  The  glory  arising  from  such  actions  is  no  conso- 
lation to  me,  and  I  cannot  suggest  it  has  any  consolation 
to  you."    Yes,  he  sought  but  duty's  iron  crown, 

"  And  not  once  or  twice  in  our  fair  island's  story, 
The  path  of  duty  was  the  way  to  glory." 

A  nation  which  follows  glory  follows  a  Will-o'-the-wisp, 
which  flutters  over  the  marshes  of  death ;  the  nation 
which  follows  duty  has  its  eye  fixed  on  the  Polar  star. 

3.  Again  many  nations — in  the  East,  from  natural 
selfishness  and  indolence  of  temperament ;  in  the  West 
from  preposterous  letter  worship  of  the  Bible— iave 
cherished  the  grovelling  idea  of  absolutism  ;  the  crawl- 
ing at  the  foot  of  some  royal  house,  the  deification  of 
some  human  divinity.  So  it  was  under  the  cruel,  blood- 
poisoned  despotism  of  Asia.  So  it  was  under  the 
wicked,  deified  Caesars.  So  it  was  for  whole  cycles  in 
China.  So  it  was,  until  quite  recently,  in  Eussia  ;  and 
so,  at  one  time — one  can  only  blush  to  say  it — the  clergy 
tried  to  make  it  at  the  most  calamitous  period  of  our 
history  under  the  Stuarts  in  England.    From  this  de- 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


225 


based  notion  that  mankind  has  no  nobler  destiny  than 
to  be  made  the  footstool  for  a  few  families  ;  that  kings 
have  a  right  divine  to  govern  wrong  ;  that  nations  ought 
to  deliver  themselves  bound  hand  and  foot  to  the  arbi- 
trary caprice  of  autocrats  ;  from  this  degraded  misuse  of 
texts  by  an  ignorant  and  time-serving  clergy,  thank 
God,  the  blood,  and  the  good  sense,  and  the  God-fearing 
manhood,  and  the  mighty  passion  for  liberty  in  the 
breasts  of  our  fathers  saved  us.  We  have  done  forever 
with  that  dismal  and  most  degrading  of  epochs — the 
day  of  servitude  without  loyalty,  and  sensualism  with- 
out love ;  when,  as  the  historian  says,  the  government 
had  just  ability  enough  to  deceive,  and  just  religion 
enough  to  persecute,  and  when  the  principles  of  liberty 
were  the  scoff  of  every  time-server  and  fool.  Yes. 
Thanks  to  the  thought,  and  the  courage  which  God  had 
put  into  the  hearts  of  a  Hampden,  and  a  Cromwell ; 
thanks  to 

"The  later  Sidney,  Marvel,  Harrington,  Young,  Vane, 
And  others  who  called  Milton  friend," 

that  false  ideal  based  on  systems  which  would  have 
made  the  Bible  the  bulwark  of  an  uncontrollable 
tyranny  is  past.  Caesarism,  autocracy,  Napoleonism  is, 
for  us  and  for  you,  impossible  forever.  When  you 
fought  against  us  in  the  war  of  independence,  you  were 
fighting  us  in  the  spirit  which  you  drew  from  our  own 
English  blood.  You  were  reteaching  us  the  lesson 
which  our  fathers  had  taught  to  you.  The  blessing  has 
come  to  us  both. 

*'  Whatever  harmonies  of  law 
The  growing  world  assume, 

15 


226 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


The  work  is  ours  ;  the  single  note 
From  that  deep  chord  which  Hampden  smote 
Will  vibrate  to  the  doom.'' 

4.  Other  nations  again,  many  of  them,  have  had  as  their 
ideal  the  gaining  of  wealth.  For  a  nation  is  but  the 
aggregate  of  its  sons,  and  the  love  of  money,  that  mam- 
mon-worship which,  as  Scripture  again  and  again  tells 
us,  cannot  coincide  with  the  service  of  God,  has  been  the 
snare  of  countless  individuals.  Of  all  false  gods,  the 
lowest  spirit  that  fell  is  Mammon,  who,  with  the  most 
hypocritical  meekness,  assumes  the  air  of  injured  in- 
nocence and  perfect  respectability  ;  even  though  he 
transform  himself  into  an  angel  of  light,  even  though 
he  hide  the  heart  of  the  demon  under  the  ephod  of  the 
saint,  like  all  false  gods.  Mammon  is  the  curse  of  all 
who  put  their  trust  in  him.  He  was  the  god  of  ancient 
Babylon,  of  ancient  Tyre,  of  declining  Eome,  and  of 
mediaeval  Spain.  "If  the  King  of  Mexico  has  any 
gold,"  said  Cortes,  "  let  him  send  it  to  us,  for  I  and  my 
companions  have  a  disease  of  the  heart  which  is  cured 
by  gold."  Yes,  and  it  was  this  disease  of  the  heart 
which  drove  the  conquerors  of  Peru  and  Mexico  to  their 
careers  of  shameless  atrocity.  But  if  our  pleasant  vices 
are  ever  made  the  instrument  to  punish  us,  from  the 
deep-vaulted  mine  springs  the  pale  fiend  Avarice,  with  a 
whip  of  scorpions  in  hand.  It  was  the  insatiable  greed,  as 
well  as  the  inquisitorial  bigotry  of  the  Spaniard,  which, 
most  of  all,  moved  the  fury  of  England — the  predes- 
tined scourge  of  that  haughty,  cruel,  and  avaricious 
power.  The  sun  of  Athens  did  not  sink  more  surely  in 
the  Bay  of  Syracuse,  than  the  glory  of  Spain  sank  with 
her  Armada  on  the  rocky  shores  of  England.    And  that 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


227 


God  may  save  His  world  from  endless  corruption,  so  it 
ever  will  and  must  be  with  every  nation  which  takes  to 
the  worship  of  "  Covetousness,  lady  of  ignoble  competi- 
tion and  of  deadly  care,  of  ignoble  victory,  builder  of 
streets  in  the  city  of  ignoble  ease."  What  has  this  ma- 
terial wealth,  the  only  kind  of  wealth  which  we  recog- 
nize, the  only  kind  of  wealth  whicli  Scripture  either 
will  not  recognize  at  all,  or  only  with  intense  warnings? 
What  has  it  ever  done  for  man  or  for  nations  ?  "  Was 
ever  any  nation  the  better  for  having  coffers  full  of 
gold  ?  Look  into  the  history  of  any  civilized  nation, 
analyzed  with  reference  to  this  one  cause  of  crime  and 
misery,  the  lives  of  thousands  of  their  nobles,  priests, 
merchants,  and  men  of  luxurious  life.  Every  other 
temptation  is  concentrated  into  this.  The  sin  of  the 
whole  world  is  essentially  the  sin  of  Judas.  Men  do 
not  disbelieve  in  Christ — they  sell  Him."  Now,  in  the 
common  name  of  England  and  America,  we  have 
pleaded  not  guilty  to  the  other  false  idols.  Can  we 
also  plead  not  guilty  to  this  ?  I  fear  not.  I  fear  that 
we  are  guilty  of  it  in  all  ranks  down  to  the  poorest ; 
guilty  of  it  as  individuals,  and  guilty  of  it  as  nations. 
The  growth  and  habit  of  luxury,  the  multiijlication 
of  things  which  are  falsely  deemed  necessary  for  life, 
the  deepening  cleft  between  capital  and  labor,  the  more 
and  more  glaring  contrast  between  the  ever-breeding 
thousands  and  boundless  superfluities  of  the  affluent 
rich  and  the  cramping  misery  and  ingrained  envy  of 
the  poor ;  the  toleration  in  great  cities  of  infamous 
streets  full  of  rotting  and  fever-causing  habitations  ; 
the  all  but  total  absence  of  the  conception  that  each  one 
is  the  steward,  and  not  the  owner,  of  what  we  have  ; 


228 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


that  wealth  is  a  talent  intrusted  to  us  for  God's  service, 
not  a  gift  heaped  on  us  for  our  own  aggrandizement ; 
the  hard  clutch  and  grip  of  that  selfishness  which  has 
never  so  much  as  tasted  the  bliss  of  doing  habitual 
kindness  to  those  that  lack  ;  the  proofs  everywhere  of  a 
passion  for  amassing  money,  which  gloats,  like  the  rich 
fool  in  the  parable,  over  its  much  goods  laid  up  for 
many  days.  Ah,  when  we  are  content  with  all  this,  are 
we  never  afraid  of  that  awful  doom  which  crashed  upon 
the  confidence  of  sensual  and  self-congratulating  ease  ? 
"  Thou  fool !  this  night — this  night  they  shall  require 
of  thee  thy  soul  ! "  There  is  no  sin  in  the  winning  of 
wealth  ;  no  sin  in  the  possession  of  wealth  ;  but  there  is 
sin — sin  which  benumbs  all  nobleness  as  with  a  torpedo- 
touch — sin  which  envenoms  all  spirituality  of  soul  as 
with  a  serpent's  sting,  in  the  worship  of  wealth  ;  in  the 
trusting  in  wealth  ;  in  the  passionate  desire  for  wealth  ; 
in  the  base  idolatry  of  wealth  ;  in  unworthy  means  of 
acquiring  wealth  ;  in  the  selfish  accumulation  of  wealth  ; 
in  the  selfish  squandering  of  wealth  ;  in  the  measuring 
by  wealth,  whether  in  dollars  or  in  pounds,  of  the 
worth  and  success  of  life.  "Despise  the  glare  of 
wealth,"  said  Joseph  Hancock  in  Boston  a  hundred 
years  ago.  "Break  asunder  with  noble  disdain  the 
chains  with  which  the  Philistines  have  bound  you." 
Ah,  if  the  life  of  England  and  of  America  become  ever 
real  enough  to  be  guided  by  the  Lord,  to  whom  we  pro- 
fess a  lip  allegiance,  let  us  judge  of  these  things  not  by 
the  smooth  tongue  of  convention,  but  by  the  plain 
words  of  Christ.  Riches  may  increase  and  may  be  a 
blessing  if  we  employ  them  nobly  ;  if  we  set  not  our 
heart  upon  them  ;  if  we  use  them  as  the  wise  men  used 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


229 


them  who  gave  to  Christ  their  gold  and  frankincense 
and  myrrh  ;  if  we  use  them  as  Joanna,  the  wife  of 
Chuza,  used  them,  to  minister  to  Him  and  His  ;  if  we 
bring  them,  as  Nicodemus  and  Joseph  of  Arimathea 
brought  them,  to  His  cross  ;  if  we  bestow  them  as 
Barnabas  bestowed  them  to  help  the  needs  of  His  strug- 
gling church.  We  in  England  have  had  some  instances 
of  a  princely  magnanimity  in  millionaires,  and  you  in 
America  yet  more.  On  the  slab  in  Westminster  Abbey, 
whereunder  lay  for  a  time  the  mortal  remains  of  George 
Peabody,  is  carved  his  daily  prayer  to  the  Giver  of  all 
wealth,  that  He  would  enable  him  before  he  died  to 
render  some  conspicuous  service  to  his  fellow-men. 
Such  examples  are  blessed  ;  would  that  they  were  mul- 
tiplied a  hundred-fold.  And  blessed,  too,  in  these  days 
is  every  example  which  illustrates  how  few  and  simple 
are  the  real  needs  of  life  ;  every  example,  whether  of  the 
rich  or  of  the  struggling,  which  pours  silent  contempt 
on  the  divinity  of  gold.  "  For  departed  kings  there 
are  appointed  honors,  and  the  wealthy  have  their  gor- 
geous obsequies ;  but  it  shall  be  the  nobler  lot  of  these 
to  clothe  nations  in  spontaneous  mourning,  and  to  go  to 
the  grave  among  the  benedictions  of  the  poor." 

Let  England  then,  and  let  America,  learn  that  swollen 
fortunes  and  material  prosperity  are  no  signs  of  a  na- 
tion's strength.  Pagan  Eome  was  never  so  strong  as 
when  her  dictators  came  from  the  ploughshare,  never  so 
weak  as  when  in  her  colossal  wealth  she  had  scarcely  a 
freeman  left.  In  the  Middle  Ages,  Papal  Eome  stood 
raking  into  chests  the  countless  gold  of  her  jubilee,  just 
before  she  endured  her  most  humiliating  disgrace. 
Spain  was  dropping  to  pieces  in  the  rottenness  of  in- 


230  Ideals  of  Nations. 

ward  decay  just  when  all  the  gold  of  the  New  World  was 
flowing  like  the  tide  of  La  Plata  into  the  treasury  of  her 
kings.  Oh,  let  us  learn  that  the  country's  wealth  means 
a  country's  weal,  and  that  does  not  consist  in  gold,  but 
in  the  justice,  the  mercy,  the  temperance,  in  the  strong, 
pure  hearts  of  her  sous  and  davighters.  Without  these 
wealth  may  be  but  a  sign  of  inward  weakness,  just  as  the 
gorgeous  conflagration  of  your  autumnal  woods  is  but  the 
precursor  of  their  barrenness  and  the  proof  of  their  decay. 

5.  Once  more,  as  some  nations  have  had  a  false  idea 
of  absolutism,  many,  and  especially  modern  nations, 
have  had  a  false  idea  of  liberty.  There  is  no  ideal  more 
grand  and  inspiring  than  that  of  true  freedom.  But 
what  is  freedom  ?  It  is  the  correlative  of  order.  It  is 
the  function  of  righteousness.  Freedom  is  self-rever- 
ence, self-knowledge,  self-control. 

"  August  obedience  by  the  world  denied 
Is  God's  economy  to  make  us  free." 

Liberty  is  not  the  liberty  to  do  wrong  unrebuked.  It  is 
not  to  do  as  we  wish,  but  as  we  ought.  It  is  not  to  fol- 
low impulses  of  appetite,  but  to  listen  to  the  dictates  of 
reason.  It  is  not  to  rend,  like  the  demoniac  among  the 
tombs  of  Gadara,  the  beneficent  features  of  just  restraint, 
but  to  sit  at  the  Lord's  feet  clothed,  and  in  our  right 
mind.  To  be  free,  for  instance,  is  not  synonymous  with 
infinite  facilities  for  drunkenness,  or  robbery,  or  wrong. 
To  be  free,  as  Milton  said,  is  the  same  thing  as  to  be 
pious,  to  be  temperate,  and  to  be  magnanimous. 

"  He  is  a  freeman  whom  the  truth  makes  free, 
And  rll  are  slaves  beside." 

The  description  "everybody"  did  that  which  was  right 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


231 


in  his  own  eyes,  which  is  rapidly  becoming  a  national 
ideal,  is  a  description  not  of  heroic  freedom,  but  of 
modem  anarchy.  Man's  liberty  ends,  and  it  ought  to 
end,  when  that  liberty  becomes  the  curse  of  his  neigh- 
bors. I  look  on  nothing  as  more  menacing  in  the  whole 
position  of  our  race  than  the  growth  through  all  classes, 
the  growth  which  is  most  disastrous  to  all  in  our  bar- 
racks and  schools  and  universities,  of  this  base  and  igno- 
rant notion  that  a  man  ought  to  be  free  to  do  what  he 
likes.  It  seems  to  me  a  drying  up  of  the  very  spring  of 
national  nobleness.  It  was  in  the  days  of  the  slave 
trade,  when,  as  we  are  told,  the  loudest  yelps  for  liberty 
always  came  from  the  drivers  of  the  negroes.  "  Would 
you  interfere  with  the  liberty  of  the  subject  ? "  sneers 
the  economist  to  the  material  reformer.  No  !  But  if 
the  liberty  of  one  subject  is  to  mean  the  slavery  of 
ten  thousand  I  would  trample  the  liberty  of  that  subject 
into  the  dust.  I  would  trample  every  vested  interest  or 
sham-vested  interest  into  the  dust  which  exists  only  for 
the  blight  and  ruin  of  mankind. 

I  would  have  no  trees  among  us,  which  ought  only  to 
grow  in  that  thicket  of  the  Inferno,  where  the  trees  are 
the  souls  of  self-destroyers,  on  whose  grim  branches  the 
Harpies  build  their  nests.  Let  us  not  confuse  liberty 
with  license ;  with  demagogism  ;  with  the  anarchy  of 
the  socialist ;  with  the  undetected  tyranny  of  rings ; 
with  the  wire-pulling  of  the  interested  ;  with  the  shout 
of  the  noisiest ;  with  the  tyranny  of  the  strongest ;  with 
the  violent  silencing  of  the  voices  of  the  wise  and  reason- 
able few  ;  with  that  dead  level  of  envious  mediocrity  in 
which  every  molehill  is  a  mountain  and  every  thistle  a 
forest  tree.    We  do  not  want  the  liberty  of  the  Reign  of 


232 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


Terror  .with  its  lullaby  the  Carmagnole,  its  toy  the  guillo- 
tine, nor  of  the  Parisian  Commune,  with  cities  shattered 
with  dynamite,  or  blazing  with  petroleum.  "That  a 
good  man  to  be  free,  as  we  call  it,"  said  Carlyle,  "and 
to  be  permitted  to  unfold  himself  in  works  of  goodness 
and  nobleness,  is  surely  a  blessing  to  him  and  to  those 
about  him,  but  that  a  man  be  free  to  be  permitted  to  un- 
fold himself  in  his  particular  way  is  contrariwise  the  fa- 
talest  curse  you  can  inflict  upon  him,  a  curse  and  noth- 
ing less  to  him  and  to  all  his  neighbors.  Him  the  very 
heavens  call  upon  you  to  persuade,  to  urge,  to  compel 
him  to  something  of  well-doing,  and  if  you  absolutely 
cannot,  the  only  blessing  left  is  the  speediest  gallows  you 
can  lead  him  to."  Liberty  cannot  be  had  but  at  the  price 
of  eternal  vigilance.  The  wise  and  the  refined  must  not 
shrink  with  cowardly  fastidiousness  from  the  effort  to 
keep  it  pure.  Nations  must  have  courage  enough  and 
nerve  enough  to  put  down  every  form  of  crime,  whether 
respectable  or  disreputable,  every  crime  whether  plated 
with  gold  or  clothed  in  rags,  with  the  infliction  of  stern, 
swift,  and  wholesome  penalties.  Liberty  is  no  true  lib- 
erty if  she  suffers  the  cheat,  or  the  officer,  or  the  treach- 
erous invader  of  her  own  prerogatives  to  find  inviolable 
refuge  under  the  shadow  of  her  shield.  She  is  false  to 
her  mighty  beneficence  if  she  deal  not  with  the  unblush- 
ing, multitudinous  immorality  of  the  states  which  spring 
up  under  her  shelter,  if  she  does  not  trample  out  of  ex- 
istence the  hot-beds  of  temptation.  Woe  to  the  nation 
which  is  not  fearlessly  faithful  enough  to  grapple  with 
its  own  vice  and  its  own  corruption.  Woe  to  the  nation 
which  has  become  too  feebly  timid  to  repress  infamy,  too 
morally  perplexed  to  scourge  the  back  of  crime.  Let 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


233 


the  hands  of  every  man  who  stands  erect,  every  man  and 
woman  in  God's  sacramental  altar  tear  down  from  its 
pedestal  the  brazen  image  of  such  a  spurious  freedom 
and  break  it  into  pieces.  CaD  it  nehushtan,  a  thing  of 
brass,  nor  suffer  men  to  exclaim  in  anger  :  "  Oh  Free- 
dom, what  crimes  are  committed  in  thy  name  ! " 

To  conclude,  then,  what  should  be  the  one  and  only 
true  ideal  of  each  nation,  if  it  would  indeed  be  a  wise 
and  understanding  people  ?  Let  the  frivolous  sneer  and 
the  faithless  deride,  but  there  is  only  one  such  ideal.  It 
is  duty.  It  is  righteousness.  It  is  the  law  of  Sinai. 
It  is  the  law  of  Christ.  It  is  purity  of  life.  It  is  hon- 
esty of  trade.  It  is  absolute  allegiance  to  truth.  It  is 
the  inviolable  sanctity  of  the  marriage  law.  There  is  a 
law  above  all  the  enactments  of  human  gods,  the  same 
in  all  times.  It  is  the  law  written  by  the  finger  of  God 
upon  the  hearts  of  men,  and  by  that  law,  unchangeable 
and  eternal,  while  men  despise,  fear,  and  loathe  rapine, 
and  abhor  blood,  they  will  reject  with  indignation  the 
delusion  that  any  iniquity  and  any  idolatry  can  ever  be 
anything  to  man  or  to  nations  but  a  ruin  and  a  curse. 
If  a  nation  be  not  the  uplifter  of  this  power  of  righteous- 
ness, it  is  predestined  to  ultimate  in  an  irretrievable 
ruin.  The  heathen  may  rage  and  the  people  imagine 
a  vain  thing,  but  where  they  strove  to  rear  their  Babels 
in  opposition  to  His  eternal  will,  God  shall  send  forth 
His  voice  and  the  earth  shall  melt  away.  "  For  glory," 
said  Oliver  Cromwell  to  the  men  of  England,  "you 
glory  in  the  ditch  which  guards  your  shores  ;  I  tell  you 
that  your  ditch  will  not  save  you  if  you  do  not  reform 
yourselves. "  It  is  no  less  true  of  America,  I  have  said 
before  ;  I  say  again,  she  may  be  the  enlightener  of  the 


234 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


nations,  the  beautiful  pioneer  in  the  vanguard  of  the 
progress  of  the  world,  but  should  the  day  ever  come 
when  she  shall  choose  to  spread  a  table  to  fortune, 
or  to  enshrine  Mammon  upon  her  altars ;  should  her 
commerce  become  dishonest,  her  press  debased,  her 
society  frivolous,  her  religion  a  tradition  and  a  sham, 
then,  though  the  double  ocean  sweep  her  illimitable 
shores,  their  waves  shall  but  flash  to  future  generations 
a  more  sad,  a  more  desolate,  and  a  more  unending  dirge. 
The  Bible  is  still  the  best  hand-book  of  the  worthy  citi- 
zen, for  it  teaches  us  many  truths  which  make  nations 
strong  and  keep  them  so.  It  will  teach  us  firmness 
in  the  appointed,  inscrutable  law  of  human  life,  and  in 
the  great  race  of  mankind  we  must  hand  down  to  future 
generations  a  brighter  and  ever  brighter  torch  of  knowl- 
edge and  of  love.  It  will  teach  us  to  know  man  simply 
as  man,  and  to  regard  all  men,  from  the  highest  to  the 
lowest,  as  absolutely  equal  before  the  bar  of  Justice; 
equally  under  the  stroke  of  her  sword,  equally  under  the 
shadow  of  her  shield.  It  will  teach  us  that  always  and 
invariably  the  unjust  and  immoral  practices  of  this  class 
must  be  put  down  in  the  interests  of  the  community, 
and  that  the  interests  of  the  community  are  subordinate 
always  to  those  of  the  entire  people.  And  it  will  teach 
us  that  the  true  glory  of  nations  lies  not  in  the  splendid 
misery  of  war,  but  in  the  dissemination  of  honorable 
happiness  and  encouragement  of  greatness,  and  the  sup- 
pression of  vice;  and  it  will  teach  us  that  the  true  wealth 
of  a  nation  is  not  in  gold  and  silver,  but  in  the  souls  of 
strong,  contented,  and  self-respecting  men ;  and  it  will 
teach  us  that  the  true  freedom  of  a  nation  lies  not  in  the 
anarchic  right  of  licensed  temptation  and  unrestricted 


Ideals  of  Nations. 


235 


facilities  for  crime,  but  in  the  bonds  of  a  material  obedi- 
ence deeply  cherished  by  the  good,  but  inexorably  en- 
forced on  all  the  bad.  When  statesmen  and  nations 
have  learned  these  lessons  they  will  not  be  long  in  learn- 
ing others.  Nations  will  aim  at  only  such  conditions  of 
life  and  government  as  shall  make  it  easy  to  do  right 
and  difficult  to  do  wrong.  They  will  see  that  politics, 
no  less  than  individual  conduct,  have  no  other  rule  than 
the  law  of  God.  Statesmen  will  not  toil  for  reward. 
They  will  not  count  on  praise.  They  will  hold  alle- 
giance to  the  loftiest  ideal  of  godliness  to  be  far  dearer 
than  claims  of  party  and  all  the  glories  of  place.  Like 
Edmund  Burke,  they  will  bring  to  polities  a  terror  of 
crime,  a  deep  humanity,  a  keen  sensibility,  a  singular 
vivacity  and  sincerity  of  consciousness.  Like  Sir  Eobert 
Peel,  they  will,  amid  all  the  fortunes  of  their  career,  be 
able  to  turn  from  the  storm  without  to  the  sunshine  of 
the  approving  heart  within.  Like  Washington  and  Lin- 
coln, they  will  be  just  and  fear  not,  putting  their  trust 
in  God.  They  will  not  be  afraid  to  cut  against  the 
grain  of  godless  prejudice.  They  will  not  be  sophisti- 
cated by  the  prudential  maxims  of  an  immoral  acquies- 
cence. They  will  sweeten  with  words  of  justice  and 
gentleness  the  conflicts  of  party.  They  will  be  quick  to 
the  encouragement  of  virtue.  They  will  be  fixed  and 
fearless,  and  all  the  strong  and  God-fearing  men  and 
women,  and  all  the  pure  and  noble,  all  the  bright  youth, 
will  help  them  to  be  inviolable,  inexorable  in  the  sup- 
pression and  extirpation,  so  far  as  the  powers  of  govern- 
ment can  do  it,  of  all  apostacy  from  the  eternal  laws  of 
God.  Happy  are  the  people  that  are  in  such  a  cause. 
Blessed  are  the  people  that  have  the  Lord  for  their  God. 


ADDRESS  I. 


Opeotng  Address  at  the  Johns  Hopkiks  Untveksitt,  Baltimobe, 
October  1,  1885. 


Mr.  President  and  Gentlemen  : 

I  EEGAKD  it  as  a  high  honor  that  I  should  have  been 
invited  to  deliver  the  opening  address  of  this  session  at 
the  Johns  Hopkins  University.  Your  country  is  honor- 
ably distinguished  for  great  institutions  founded  by 
private  munificence,  and  none  of  these  institutions  is, 
I  am  informed,  more  prosperous  or  more  productive  of 
great  results  than  the  University  whose  members  I  have 
the  honor  to  address.  It  was  founded  in  the  interest 
of  that  sound  learning  which  may  itself  be  made  no 
small  element  in  religious  education.  May  I  not  apply 
to  it  the  words  of  your  great  American  orator  :  "  If  we 
work  upon  marble,  it  will  perish  ;  if  we  work  upon 
brass,  time  will  efface  it ;  if  we  rear  temples,  they  will 
crumble  to  the  dust ;  but  if  we  work  upon  immortal 


Modern  Education.  237 


minds,  if  we  imbue  them  with  high  principles,  with  the 
just  fear  of  God  and  love  of  their  fellow-men,  we  en- 
grave on  those  tablets  something  which  no  time  can 
efface,  but  which  will  brighten  and  brighten  to  all 
eternity." 

1.  No  one  can  read  the  reports  and  programmes  of 
your  University  without  being  at  once  struck  with  the 
fact  that  you,  like  Lord  Bacon,  take  for  your  province 
the  whole  range  of  human  knowledge.  You  do  not 
indeed  formally  teach  the  science  of  Theology.  You 
assume  no  religious  name,  you  wear  no  ecclesiastical 
badge ;  but  I  observe  that  even  theology  and  church  his- 
tory have  been  included  in  your  public  lectures.  You 
are,  as  your  President  has  observed,  united  in  the  search 
for  truth  and  the  maintenance  of  faith.  Successive 
generations  of  American  youths  are  here  taught 

"  To  sit,  self-governed,  in  the  fiery  prime 
Of  youth,  obedient  at  the  feet  of  law." 

And  though  free  from  sectarian  bias,  you  have  ever 
desired  this  University  to  be  pervaded  by  the  spirit  of 
enlightened  Christianity.  God  has  many  Bibles — 
nature,  law,  history,  the  mind  and  thoughts  of  man. 
You  neglect  none  of  them.  Psychology  reveals  to  you 
the  nature  and  the  limitations  of  the  thinking  mind. 
In  the  domain  of  History  you  examine  the  records  of 
all  nations  in  all  ages.  In  the  domain  of  Law  you 
study  the  codes  and  the  customs  of  every  branch  of 
mankind.  In  Mathematics  you  do  not  shrink  from 
the  most  abstruse  researches.  You  look  on  Art  as  a 
revealer  and  interpreter  of  nature.  In  Science  your 
professors  teach 


238  Modern  Education. 


"  Something  of  the  frame,  the  rock, 
The  star,  the  bird,  the  shell,  the  fish,  the  flower. 
Electric,  chemic  laws." 

We  may  apply  to  your  lecturers  the  words  of  Ovid  : 

"  Cumque  animo  et  vigili  perspexerat  omnia  cura, 
In  medium  discenda  dabat  .  .  . 
Et  rerum  causas  et  quid  Natuva  docebat, 
Quid  Deus. " 

They  teach  about  the  works  of  Nature;  they  lead 
through  Nature  up  to  Nature's  God. 

3.  We  are  apt  to  become  so  familiar  with  the  progress 
of  our  own  generation  that  we  take  its  most  distinctive 
phenomena  as  the  merest  matter  of  course.  And  yet  to 
the  elder  among  us  the  exhaustiveness  which  marks  the 
curriculum  of  your  University  is  nothing  less  than  a 
memorable  sign  of  the  times.  I  do  not  suppose  that, 
fifty  years  ago,  any  such  University  existed  in  any  coun- 
try of  the  English-speaking  race.  In  England,  at  any 
rate,  I  can  recall  the  by  no  means  distant  day  when  the 
whole  of  a  boy's  education  was  practically  confined  to 
that  branch  of  education  which  was  known  as  "the 
Classics."  English  education  at  the  public  schools 
consisted  solely  of  the  study  of  the  Greek  and  Latin 
tongues.  It  was  a  training  which  neglected  some  of  the 
powers  of  all  minds,  and,  what  was  far  worse,  all  the 
powers  of  some  minds.  A  multitude  of  boys,  with 
aptitudes  for  many  noble  acquirements,  were  suffered 
to  grow  up  in  an  ignorance  which  would  "have  been 
ludicrous  if  it  had  not  been  deplorable — an  ignorance 
limitless  and  unfathomable  ;  an  ocean  without  a  bottom 
and  without  a  shore.   It  was  a  system  under  which  boys 


Modern  Education.  239 


like  Samuel  Parr  grew  up  as  little  prodigies,  but  boys 
like  Humphry  Davy  and  Walter  Scott  grew  up  as 
little  dunces.  It  was  a  system  which  tried  to  treat  the 
plastic  clay  like  the  unyielding  marble,  and  to  give  the 
same  lustre  to  the  diamond  and  to  the  chalk.  It  was  a 
system  under  which  bright  English  lads — human  ma- 
terial which  was  both  intellectually  and  physically 
among  the  finest  in  the  world — grew  up  in  ignorance  of 
all  history,  even  of  their  own  history,  though  it  is  a 
history  of  ever-broadening  freedom ;  and  of  all  litera- 
ture, even  of  their  own,  though  it  is  without  a  parallel 
in  all  the  world ;  ignorant  also  of  every  modem  lan- 
guage, of  every  conceivable  branch  of  science,  of  every 
faculty  and  method  of  observation,  and  even  of  every- 
thing best  worth  knowing  in  the  two  ancient  languages 
to  which  all  things  else  were  so  ruthlessly  sacrificed. 
Within  living  memory  the  head  master  of  a  great  Eng- 
lish public  school  made  it  rather  a  subject  of  boast  to 
his  head  pupils  that  he  had  no  conception  where  Elis 
was.  It  is  not  the  least  exaggeration  to  say  that  seven 
or  eight  of  the  brightest  and  most  impressionable  years 
of  life  were  spent  over  Greek  and  Latin  by  the  majority 
of  boys,  and  ended  in  their  not  acquiring  the  inflections 
of  a  single  Greek  verb,  and  in  not  attaining  the  power 
to  write  even  the  most  incorrect  and  impossible  couplet 
of  elegiac  verse ;  while  many,  on  the  other  hand,  who 
were  regarded  as  comparatively  successful,  could  only 
write  Lutin  prose  which — when  it  was  not  a  mere  mosaic 
of  borrowed  phrases — would  have  made  Quintilian  stare 
and  gasp,  and  Greek  iambics  at  which  I  will  not 
say  a  Theognis,  but  even  an  Athenian  school- boy,  would 
have  died  of  laughing.   When  I  was  first  a])pointed  one 


240  Modern  Education. 


of  the  masters  at  Harrow  School,  some  thirty  years  ago, 
this  system  was  still  in  full  vogue,  with  but  slight  con- 
cessions to  mathematics  and  modern  languages  ;  and  I 
shall  always  remember  with  pride  that,  amid  much 
obloquy  and  opposition,  I  gave  lectures  at  the  London 
Royal  Institution,  the  Birmingham  Institute,  and  other 
places,  which  helped  in  their  small  measure  to  give  it 
its  death-blow.  At  that  time  there  was  scarcely  a  single 
public  school  in  England  in  which  many  hours  were  not 
devoted,  every  week,  by  every  boy  alike,  to  the  fantastic 
folly  of  writing  verses  in  languages  of  which  they  had  not 
mastered  the  merest  elements.  Now  there  is  scarcely  a 
single  school  at  which  this  absurd  system  still  continues 
to  linger  on.  Then  there  was  scarcely  a  single  school 
which  could  boast  of  a  master  in  science  ;  now  even  the 
humblest  schools  would  be  ashamed  to  be  without  one. 
Even  the  Universities  were  but  little  better.  At  Cam- 
bridge mathematics  flourished,  and  the  Classical  Tripos 
tested  a  knowledge  of  Greek  and  Latin  almost  exclu- 
sively as  languages  ;  at  Oxford  mathematics  were  only 
studied  by  a  small  minority,  and  the  Schools  tested  a 
knowledge  of  Greek  and  Latin  almost  exclusively  as 
literature.  Happily,  in  the  last  thirty  years,  we  have 
changed  all  that.  At  present  at  our  Universities,  as  at 
yours,  due  honor  is  accorded  to  every  branch  of  human 
knowledge. 

3.  Let  me  say  at  once  that  I  should  stamp  myself  as 
a  barbarian — or,  as  Mr.  Matthew  Arnold  prefers  to 
call  it,  a  Philistine — if  I  felt  any  hostility  or  implied 
any  dislike  toward  the  classical  studies  in  which  a 
great  part  of  my  youth  and  manhood  have  been  hap- 
pily passed.    All  that  I  strove  to  do  in  past  days  was  to 


Modern  Education.  241 


break  down  the  dominant  tyranny,  the  absolute  autoc- 
racy of  classical  training ;  not  by  any  means  to  dispar- 
age it  altogether.    For  many  minds,  at  any  rate, 

"  The  proper  study  of  mankind  is  man." 

If  History  and  Literature  must  always  rank  among  the 
most  indispensable  instruments  of  education,  then  cer- 
tainly we  shall  never  be  able  to  throw  aside  altogether 
the  study  of  those  two  languages  which  were  spoken  by 
the  two  noblest  of  the  ancient  nations,  because  they  en- 
shrine a  history  and  a  literature  which  are  of  all  others 
the  most  instructive  to  mankind.  Perhaps  you  will 
think  that,  having  once  commented  severely  on  classical 
studies,  I  now  turn  round  and  eulogize  them — like  the 
poet  Stesichorus,  who,  after  writing  contumeliously 
about  Helen  of  Troy,  was  compelled  by  her  wrathful 
phantom  to  write  a  palinode.  Such,  however,  is  not 
the  case.  I  should  urge  as  strongly  as  I  ever  did,  that 
classical  education  should  never  be  exclusive,  but  I 
should  always  plead  with  equal  earnestness  that  it 
should  never  be  excluded. 

4.  Nay  more,  the  ancient  languages  are  now  studied 
so  thoroughly  that  I  would  deprecate  the  application 
of  the  word  "science"  to  none  but  physical  inquiries. 
There  are  two  worlds — the  world  of  nature  and  the 
world  of  man  ;  but  man  controls  nature,  and  nature  in- 
cludes man.  In  other  words,  the  comprehension  of  the 
laws  of  nature  involves  a  study  not  only  of  things  and 
their  forces,  but  also  of  men  and  their  ways;  and  if 
man  would  be  a  worthy  lord  of  creation  he  must  not 
only  learn  its  laws,  but  also  fashion  his  soul  in  har- 
mony with  their  teaching.  We  cannot  do  without  the 
16 


242  Modern  Education. 


experience  of  the  world  as  it  has  been  enshrined  for  all 
time  in  its  noblest  literature.  We  are  the  children  of 
the  past.  It  lives  and  throbs  through  every  fibre  of  our 
present.  "  Our  finest  hope  is  finest  memory."  There 
is  no  error  so  dangerous  to  humanity  as  that  of  trying 
to  divorce  and  dissever  ourselves  from  those  who  have 
gone  before  us.  The  answer  of  the  old  Carthusian 
monk  to  the  trifler  who  asked  him  how  he  got  through 
his  time  was,  as  Arnold  has  reminded  us,  both  beautiful 
and  wise :  Cogitavi  dies  antiquos  et  annos  aeternos  in 
mente  Tiahui — I  have  considered  the  days  of  old  and 
the  years  of  ancient  times. 

5.  The  exclusive  despotism  of  the  Greek  and  Latin  in 
education  was  due,  in  fact,  to  their  inherent  powers. 
It  was  a  survival  of  the  Renaissance.  The  glorious 
literature  of  Hellas  and  of  Rome  shone  like  a  new  dawn, 
burst  like  a  new  life,  flowed  in  like  a  freshening  and 
vernal  breeze  upon  minds  long  darkened  by  the  dreari- 
ness of  scholasticism  and  cramped  in  the  iron  net-work 
of  the  feudal  system.  You  may  estimate  the  force  of 
that  Renaissance — of  that  new  birth — by  the  impulse 
which  it  gave  to  the  genius  of  men  like  Bacon  and 
Shakespeare,  and  by  the  passion  felt  by  scholars  of  that 
day  for  classical  learning.  Mr.  Browning's  brilliant 
poem.  The  Grammarian's  Funeral,  illustrates  the  force 
and  fervor  of  that  passion.  Erasmus  studied  by  moon- 
liglit,  because  he  could  not  afford  a  penny  to  buy 
a  torch.  Queen  Elizabeth  answered  a  learned  deputa- 
tion both  in  Latin  and  in  Greek,  and,  as  Roger  Ascham 
tells  us,  studied  Socrates  and  Sophocles,  no  young  stu- 
dent at  a  University  more  daily  or  more  duly.  Lady 
Jane  Grey — 


Modern  Education.  243 


"  Seventeen,  a  rose  of  grace, 
Girl  never  breathed  to  rival  such  a  rose. 
Rose  never  blew  that  equalled  such  a  bud  " — 

knew  eight  languages,  and  preferred  the  pages  of  Pla- 
to's Plmdo  to  the  exhilaration  of  the  chase.  Gram- 
mar schools,  of  which  Harrow  and  Kugby  and  West- 
minster are  noble  specimens,  sprang  up  all  over  the 
country,  and  presented  two  features  of  special  interest. 
One  was  the  mixture  of  all  classes ;  the  other  was  the 
devotion  to  the  classic  languages.  The  school  at  which 
I  was  first  taught  as  a  little  child  illustrated  both  pecu- 
liarities. It  went  by  the  long-disused  name  of  "The 
Latin  School,"  and  I  recall  with  pleasure  that  in  that 
school  I  was  taught  on  the  same  benches,  and  sat  side 
by  side  with  boys  taken  from  all,  and  even  from  the 
humblest,  grades  of  society. 

6.  It  is,  then,  an  additional  distinction  to  your  Uni- 
versity that,  among  so  many  professors  and  instructors, 
you  also  have  eminent  professors  of  Greek  and  Latin. 
An  immense  and  narrowing  fallacy  lay  under  the  famous 
remarks  of  Mr.  Richard  Cobden,  that  a  single  copy  of 
the  Times  was  of  more  value  to  a  modern  Englishman 
than  the  history  of  Thucydides,  and  that  it  was  unim- 
portant to  know  much  about  the  river  Ilyssus,  because 
he  had  seen  the  Athenian  laundresses  washing  their 
clothes  in  it.  The  Times  newspaper  has  its  own  use- 
ful function,  but  we  do  not  hear  in  it  that  voice  of  the 
Sibyl,  which,  as  Herodotus  says,  "uttering  things  sim- 
ple and  unperfumed  and  unadorned  reaches  through  in- 
numerable years,  because  of  God."  The  Ilyssus,  after  all, 
is  of  more  importance  to  civilized  mankind  than  the 
Yenisei  or  the  Obi.    Bigness  is  not  greatness.  Attica 


244  Modern  Education. 


is  greater  than  Warwickshire,  though  only  the  same 
size;  and  "Abana  and  Pharpar  hicent  streams,"  the 
rivers  of  Damascus  are  not  better  than  all  the  waters 
of  Israel,  though  they  are  broader  and  more  deep. 

7.  Consider,  for  instance,  the  unparalleled  beauty  and 
grandeur  of  Greek  and  Latin  merely  as  languages.  It 
is  many  years  since  I  read  the  eulogium  pronounced 
upon  them  by  H.  N.  Coleridge,  but  I  still  recall  some 
of  his  expressions.  "Greek,"  he  says,  "the  shrine  of 
the  genius  of  the  old  world  ;  as  universal  as  our  race  ;  as 
individual  as  ourselves ;  of  infinite  flexibility ;  of  in- 
defatigable strength  ;  with  words  like  pictures ;  with 
words  like  the  gossamer  threads  of  the  summer;  to 
which  nothing  was  vulgar,  from  which  nothing  was 
excluded  ;  at  once  the  sunlight  and  breadth  of  Homer, 
the  gloom  and  intensity  of  ^schylus  ;  not  fathomed  to 
the  depth  by  Plato ;  not  compressed  to  the  utmost  by 
Thucydides  ;  not  lighted  up  with  all  its  ardor,  nor  roll- 
ing with  all  its  thunder,  even  under  the  promethean 
touch  of  Demosthenes.  And  Latin,  the  voice  of  em- 
pire and  of  law,  of  war  and  of  the  state  ;  stamped  with 
the  impress  of  an  imperious  and  despotizing  republic ; 
rigid  in  its  constructions,  parsimonious  in  its  synonyms; 
the  true  language  of  history,  instinct  with  the  spirit  of 
natures,  not  with  the  passions  of  individuals  ;  breathing 
the  maxims  of  the  race  and  not  the  tenets  of  the  schools; 
tried  to  the  utmost  by  Virgil,  and  by  him  found  want- 
ing ;  yielding  reluctantly  to  the  flowery  yoke  of  Horace  ; 
exhibiting  glimpses  of  Greek-like  splendor  in  the  occa- 
sional inspirations  of  Lucretius  ;  but  still  one  and  the 
same  in  character,  whether  handled  by  the  genial  and 
discursive  Livy,  by  the  refined  and  haughty  Sallast, 


Modern  Education.  245 


by  the  reseryed  and  thoughtful  Tacitus."  The  eulogy 
is  not  exaggerated.  In  their  synthetic  perfection 
Greek  and  Latin  are  among  the  grandest  languages 
known  to  man  ;  and  tliough  it  is  not  necessary  that 
all  should  master  them,  no  great  system  of  education 
can  ever  neglect  this  most  priceless  possession,  which 
Providence  has  preserved  for  the  human  race  from  the 
wrecks  of  barbarism  and  decay. 

8.  It  is  needless  to  dwell  on  the  obvious  fact  that 
these  perfect  languages,  enshrining  magnificent  litera- 
tures, have  been  enriched  by  consummate  artists  with 
some  of  the  finest  gems  of  thought — 

"Which  on  the  stretched  forefinger  of  all  time 
Sparkle  forever." 

It  may  be  more  to  the  purpose  to  observe  that  their 
dominance  was  not  a  brief  one.  Each  lasted  in  its 
glory  for  more  than  a  thousand  years.  Greek  is  not 
only  the  language  of  Homer  and  Hesiod,  of  vEschylus 
and  Sophocles,  of  Plato  and  Aristotle,  but  also  of  the 
late  and  noble  Stoics,  of  the  glorious  slave  Epictetus, 
of  the  holy  emperor  Marcus  Aurelius.  It  is  the  lan- 
guage not  only  of  Demosthenes  in  the  Pnyx,  but  of  St. 
Paul  on  the  Areopagus.  It  is  the  langauge  also  of 
Revelation  and  of  the  Fathers.  In  it  the  New  Testa- 
ment was  first  written,  and  the  Old  Testament  was 
first  translated.  In  it  Philo  as  well  as  Heraclitus  phil- 
osophized. In  it  St.  Chrysostom  as  well  as  Socrates 
preached.  And  Latin  is  not  only  the  language  of 
Ennius  and  Virgil,  but  also  of  Augustine  and  Jerome. 
It  was  the  medium  of  communication  between  scholars 
for  many  generations.    It  is  the  language  of  legislators, 


246 


Modern  Education. 


from  the  Twelve  Tables  down  to  William  the  Conqueror ; 
of  theology,  from  Tertullian  to  Thomas  Aquinas.  It 
is  the  language  of  the  Reformation — of  Melanchthon's 
Loci  Communes,  and  of  Calvin's  Institutes.  It  is  the 
language  of  Freedom — alike  of  tlie  Magna  Charta  and 
of  Milton's  Defensio.  It  is  even  the  language  of 
Science.  In  Latin  were  first  written  the  De  Orhium 
Revolutionibus  of  Copernicus ;  and  the  Novum  Orga- 
num  of  Bacon ;  and  the  De  Martis  Stella  of  Kepler ; 
and  the  Principia  of  Newton  ;  and  the  Systema  Natu- 
rae of  Linnaeus ;  and  the  Exercitationes  de  Motu 
Cordis  et  Sanguinis  of  Harvey.  You  will  see,  then, 
the  vast  realms  which  these  languages  cover.  Greek  is 
the  key  to  the  temples  of  religion,  no  less  than  to  the 
gardens  of  the  Hesperides.  And  Latin  will  introduce 
you  not  only  to 

"  The  forum  where  immortal  actions  glow, 
And  still  the  eloquent  air  breathes,  burns  of  Cicero," 

but  also  to  the  laboratories  of  science  and  the  courts  of 
law.  Neither  of  them  is  in  reality  a  dead  language.  If 
you  can  read  Thucydides,  you  can  read  Anna  Comnena, 
or  Tricoupi,  or  a  modern  Greek  newspaper.  If  you  can 
read  Latin,  it  will  cost  you  scarcely  an  effort  to  read 
also  Italian,  Spanish,  and  French.  It  may  be  said  then 
of  these  languages,  as  truly  as  poetically,  that  "their 
fruits  are  the  fruits  of  nepenthe,  and  their  flowers  are 
flowers  of  amaranth." 

9.  An  immense  service  has,  however,  been  rendered 
to  the  whole  cause  of  education  by  that  indefinite  widen- 
ing of  the  curriculum  which  recognizes  that  the  best 
Greek  and  Latin  scholar  who  ever  lived  is  but  indif- 


Modern  Education.  247 


ferently  educated  if  amid  the  dread  magnificence  of  the 
unintelligent  creation,  and  the  deepening  knowledge  of 
living  organisms,  and  the  exquisite  inventions  of  ap- 
plied science,  which  have  multiplied  a  million-fold  the 
natural  powers  of  man,  he  has  been  suffered  to  grow  up 
in  ignorance  of  the  laws  of  nature.  He  is  but  imper- 
fectly educated  if  he  knows  nothing  of  the  earth's  orbit; 
of  the  sun  which  rules  our  system  ;  of  the  moon  which 
sways  the  tides ;  of  the  sea  which,  hour  by  hour,  re- 
freshes the  world  with  its  lustral  ebb  and  flow  ;  of  the 
Gulf-stream  which  warms  our  coasts ;  of  the  steady 
trade-winds  which  swell  our  sails  : — if  he  has  heard 
nothing  of  the  melting  fire,  the  rushing  waters,  the 
variegated  marble,  the  yielding  clay ;  nothing  of  the 
trees  of  the  Lord  which  are  full  of  sap,  even  the  cedars 
of  Lebanon  which  He  hath  planted  ;  nothing  of  thunder 
and  lightning,  of  rain  and  dew,  of  snow  and  hoar-frost, 
of  the  rainbow  and  the  mirage,  of  the  pressure,  the 
buoyancy,  and  the  elasticity  of  the  invisible,  bright  air. 
This  is  the  very  age  of  science  and  of  progress.  The 
thirteenth  century  may  boast  the  name  of  Roger  Bacon, 
the  fifteenth  that  of  Columbus,  the  sixteenth  of  Vesalius, 
the  seventeenth  of  Galileo,  the  eighteenth  of  Newton, 
but  assuredly  the  nineteenth  has  as  yet  been  unsur- 
passed. The  whole  of  civilization  has  in  this  century 
sped  forward  with  amazing  development.  Groups  of  log 
huts  have  grown  into  immense  cities  ;  savage  islands  of 
cannibal  chieftains  have  become  emporiums  of  com- 
merce ;  the  most  trackless  depths  of  virgin  forests  have 
heard  the  scream  of  the  steam-engine  ;  isthmuses  have 
been  cut  through  ;  mountains  have  been  tunnelled;  vast 
fens  and  barren  moors,  drained  and  cultivated,  have 


248  Modern  Education. 


rolled  with  billows  of  golden  corn.  Was  education  alone 
to  be  stationary  ?  Was  she  alone  to  remain  ignorant  of 
the  precious  secrets  which  nature  had  been  forced  to  un- 
clinch  from  her  granite  hand  ?  Truly,  as  Dr.  Arnold 
said,  "there  is  nothing  so  revolutionary,  because  there 
is  nothing  so  unnatural  and  conYulsive,  as  this  strain  to 
keep  things  fixed  wlien  all  the  world  is,  by  the  very  law 
of  its  creation,  in  eternal  progress;  and  the  course  of  all 
the  evils  in  the  world  can  be  traced  to  that  natural  but 
most  deadly  error  of  human  indolence  and  corruption, 
that  our  biisiness  is  to  presei-ve  and  not  to  improve." 

10.  It  is  impossible,  therefore,  not  to  read  with  pecul- 
iar satisfaction  the  long,  the  varied,  the  splendid  list  of 
subjects  which  this  University  teaches — subjects  each  of 
which  is  sufficient  to  inspire  the  devotion  of  a  lifetime. 
There  can  be  no  mind  so  peculiarly  constituted  as  not 
to  find  scope  here  for  its  capacities.  The  minds  of  men 
radically  differ.  There  are  those  who,  like  the  late 
Dean  Stanley,  find  their  main  delight  in  studying  the 
history  and  the  thoughts  of  men.  There  are  others 
who,  like  the  late  President  of  the  Royal  Society,  breathe 
most  easily  the  empyrean  of  abstract  conceptions,  and 
for  whom  the  cold  mountain-heights  of  reason  have 
sufficient  charm,  without  one  sunbeam  of  imagination 
to  brighten  them.  An  Oxford  scholar  is  said  to  have 
remarked  that  he  had  glanced  through  the  six  books  of 
Euclid,  and  did  not  think  that  there  was  much  in  him. 
A  Cambridge  Senior  Wrangler  is  reported  to  have  said 
that  he  had  read  the  Paradise  Lost,  and  could  not  see 
that  it  proved  anything.  But  it  is  not  necessary  to  quote 
instances  which  are  probably  mythical.  I  once  received 
a  letter  from  the  late  Charles  Darwin,  in  which  he  told 


Modern  Education.  249 


me  that,  as  a  boy,  he  was  under  a  great  scholar — Dr. 
Butler,  of  Shrewsbury — but  had  never  learned  anything 
at  school,  except  what  he  taught  himself,  in  private 
chemical  experiments  ;  and  when  this  came  to  the  head 
master's  ears,  instead  of  encouraging  him,  he  was  very 
angry,  and  called  him  before  the  whole  form  a  'poco 
curante,  which,  as  he  did  not  know  what  it  meant, 
must  (he  thought)  be  something  very  dreadful.  Clearly, 
minds  which  are  so  diSerently  constituted  and  so  dif- 
ferently endowed  ought  not  to  be  stretched  on  the 
Procrustean  bed  of  one  unvarying  curriculum.  St. 
Bernard  was  so  unobservant,  so  full  of  mystic  contem- 
plation, that  he  rides  all  day  along  the  Lake  of  Geneva, 
and  in  the  evening  asks  where  the  lake  was.  Linnaeus, 
on  the  other  hand,  was  so  keenly  alive  to  the  works  of 
nature,  that  he  falls  upon  his  knees  under  the  open  day 
to  thank  God  for  a  field  ablaze  with  the  glory  of  golden 
gorse.  Salmasius  fills  folio  pages  with  dissertations 
about  the  silks,  half-silks,  and  linen  garments  of  the 
ancients,  while  he  knows  nothing  of  the  commonest 
trades  of  Dijon  and  of  Lyons.  His  rival,  Milton,  writes 
immortal  verse,  and  helps  to  make  England  free.  Alex- 
ander Castren,  a  philologist  of  a  noble  order,  though 
in  delicate  health,  travels  alone  in  his  sledge  along  the 
coasts  of  the  Polar  Sea,  and  lives  for  months  in  the 
greasy  huts  of  the  Samojeds  to  learn  their  dialects. 
Conrad  Sprengel  lies  all  day  long  beside  a  single  flower 
to  convince  himself  that  its  fertilization  is  solely  effected 
by  the  visits  of  insects.  Bernard  de  Jussieu  tracks  the 
fertilizing  pollen  of  a  pistachio  over  miles  of  streets  and 
gardens.  Lord  Monboddo  in  the  preface  to  his  Origin 
of  Language,  being  exclusively  interested  in  that  sub- 


250  Modern  Education. 


ject,  speaks  with  intense  scorn  of  entomologists  like 
Reaumur,  who  had  written  in  six  quarto  volumes  the 
history  of  flies  with  two  wings  and  flies  with  four  wings, 
with  a  supplement  to  the  history  of  flies  with  two  wings, 
and  yet  had  not  professed  to  produce  a  history  of  in- 
sects, but  only  contributions  to  such  a  history.  It  would 
be  easy  to  collect  passages  from  literature  which  thus 
express  the  scorn  of  men's  mutual  ignorance ;  but  man- 
kind is  now  beginning  to  perceive  that  it  is  as  danger- 
ous to  neglect  the  study  of  nature  as  to  neglect  the 
study  of  mind.  The  fertility  of  continents,  the  food  of 
populations,  even  the  health  and  happiness  of  man- 
kind, may  be  dependent  on  the  observations  of  natural- 
ists who  study  flowers,  and  aphides,  and  entozoa,  at  least 
as  much  as  on  the  minutiae  of  those  learned  philologists 
who  trace 

"  A  panting  syllable  through  time  and  space, 
Start  it  at  home  and  hunt  it  in  the  dark, 
To  Gaul,  to  Greece,  and  into  Noah's  ark." 

11.  Clearly,  then,  at  every  ideal  University  time 
must  be  found  for  the  study  of  the  whole  circle  of  the 
sciences ;  and,  as  I  have  endeavored  to  point  out  the 
educational  value  of  philology,  you  will  perhaps  pardon 
me  if  I  venture  to  trespass  a  little  longer  upon  your  time, 
and  to  show  how  transcendent  are  the  claims  of  science 
to  occupy  a  large  share  in  all  schemes  of  human  edu- 
cation. 

i.  First,  I  would  mention  the  delight  of  it.  God  has 
placed  us  in  a  world  where  we  can  admire 

"The  beauty,  and  the  wonder,  and  the  power, 
The  shapes  of  things,  their  colors,  lights  and  shades, 
Chauges,  surprises,  and  God  made  it  all." 


Modern  Education.  251 


From  this  world  we  can  look  up  into  the  overarching 
heaven,  and  see  lucid  openings  into  the  pure,  deep 
empyrean.  It  is  simply  impossible  to  estimate  the 
difference  in  the  degrees  of  happiness  registered  by  the 
mind  of  the  one  who  goes  through  life  with  the  seeing 
eye  and  the  hearing  ear,  and  one  who  is  deaf  and  blind 
to  the  glories  and  melodies  of  the  planet  which  God  has 
made  his  dwelling-place.  There  is  no  mistake  more 
irreparable  in  the  training  of  the  human  soul  for  happi- 
ness in  the  world  around  it  than  the  permitting  the  pow- 
ers of  observation  to  atrophy  from  lack  of  use.  The  man 
of  science  has  as  much  right  to  say  as  the  artist  or  the 
poet, 

"  The  world's  no  blank  for  me  ; 
No  blot ; — it  means  intensely,  and  means  good." 

ii.  And  secondly,  this  delight  in  observation  is  accom- 
panied with  the  most  direct  usefulness.  It  is  amazing 
to  think  how  much  the  world  may  gain  from  simply 
noticing  the  most  common  facts,  and  endeavoring  to 
grasp  their  significance.  Many  of  the  world's  great  dis- 
coveries are  attributed  to  accident,  but  such  accidents 
happen  only  to  the  most  trained  and  observant  mind. 
Nature  may  delight  us  all  with  her  innocent  enchant- 
ments, but  she  only  opens  her  richest  treasures  to  the 
followers  of  Hercules,  the  earnest  and  laborious  searchers 
after  truth.  It  is  only  to  a  Newton  that  the  fall  of  an 
apple  reveals  that  the  parabola  of  a  comet  and  the  drop- 
ping of  a  roseleaf  are  effects  of  one  and  the  same  causes, 
and  that 

"  The  very  law  which  moulds  a  tear, 

And  keeps  it  trickling  in  its  source, 
The  same  preserves  the  world  its  sphere, 
And  guides  the  planets  in  their  course." 


252  Modern  Education. 


It  is  only  to  a  Watts  that  the  condensation  of  steam  from 
a  kettle  or  the  bowl  of  a  teaspoon  was  the  dawning  in- 
spiration of  the  steam-engine.  It  is  only  to  a  Galvani 
that  the  twitching  of  a  frog's  leg,  when  touched  by  a 
scalpel  which  had  been  in  contact  with  an  electrical  ma- 
cliine,  becomes  the  birth-throe  of  a  new  science.  Galileo, 
when  but  a  boy,  saw  the  bronze  lamp  swing  in  the 
cathedral  at  Pisa,  and  measuring  its  rhythmic  oscilla- 
tion by  the  beating  of  his  pulse,  discovers  the  isochron- 
ism  of  the  pendulum,  which  leads  to  the  most  splendid 
discoveries  of  a  splendid  life.  The  children  of  a  spec- 
tacle maker  at  Middleborough  play  with  lenses,  and  we 
soon  get  the  telescope  and  the  microscope.  Huyghens 
notices  that  a  piece  of  Iceland  spar  divides  a  beam  of 
light  so  as  to  cause  a  double  refraction,  and  we  have  a 
new  means  for  discovering  the  deepest  secrets  of  the 
stars.  Mains  develops  some  of  the  most  brilliant  facts 
of  polarization  after  amusing  himself  by  looking  through 
a  piece  of  spar  at  the  reflection  of  a  gorgeous  sunset  on 
the  windows  of  the  Luxembourg.  Hundreds  of  discov- 
eries have  been  made  in  similar  ways,  and  they  might 
perhaps  have  been  anticipated  by  centuries  if  the  powers 
of  observation  had  been  rightly  trained,  as  they  have 
been  for  many  ages  universally  neglected. 

iii.  Thirdly,  the  incessant  linear  progress  of  science  is 
the  immediate  reward  of  its  study.  The  ancients  had 
discovered  that  electricity  was  developed  by  rubbing 
amber,  and  a  hundred  years  ago  Humboldt  saw  the  naked 
copper-colored  children  of  the  Indians  on  the  banks  of 
the  Orinoco,  amusing  themselves  by  attracting  fibres  of 
cotton  and  bamboo  with  the  electricity  evolved  by  rub- 
bing the  shining  seeds  of  the  Nigretia.     How  many 


Modern  Education.  253 


millions  have  been  awestricken  by  the  lightning  without 
dreaming  that  they  might  brush  it  out  of  a  cat's  back  or 
out  of  their  own  hair.  What  an  advance  was  made, 
when  on  June  15,  1775,  with  no  more  exalted  mechan- 
ism than  a  boy's  kite,  a  small  key  and  a  hempen  string, 
your  own  great  Benjamin  Franklin,  he  who, 

"Eripuit  coelo  fulmen,  sceptrumque  tyrannis," 

sent  up  the  kite  toward  a  dark  cloud,  suddenly  saw 
the  hempen  fibres  bristling  on  the  string,  heard  a 
crackling  noise,  presented  his  knuckle  to  the  key,  and 
received  the  electric  spark.  "I  heaved,"  he  said,  "a 
deep  sigh,  and  conscious  of  an  immortal  name,  felt 
that  I  could  have  been  content  had  that  moment  been 
my  last."  What  a  stride  was  made  beyond  the  dis- 
coveiT  of  Franklin,  when  men  learned  to  seize  that 
lightning  by  its  wing  of  fire,  and  bid  it  flash  their  mes- 
sages in  one  moment  round  the  girdled  globe.  But  once 
more,  what  another  stride,  when  the  electric  cable  was 
laid  down  the  sides  of  marine  volcanoes,  under  tempestu- 
ous seas,  and  on  the  plateaus,  formed  during  endless  ages, 
of  delicate  microscopic  shells ; — when,  in  the  language 
of  your  orator,  "  messages  of  friendship  and  love  from 
warm,  loving  bosoms  burned  over  the  cold,  green  bones 
of  men  and  women,  whose  hearts,  once  as  warm  as  ours, 
burst  as  the  eternal  gulfs  closed  and  roared  over  them 
centuries  ago."  What  a  stride  of  linear  progress  in  our 
knowledge  of  electricity  beyond  the  most  learned  of  the 
earlier  ages,  when  men  were  able  at  last  to  answer  the 
question  in  the  Book  of  Job,  "  Canst  thou  send  forth 
the  lightnings,  that  they  may  go  and  say  unto  thee. 
Here  we  are  ?  " 


254  Modern  Education. 


iv.  I  fear  to  weary  you,  so  I  will  add  but  one  word  on 
the  beneficence  of  science.  Of  all  the  mistakes  of 
ancient  Greek  poets  and  philosophers  none  was  greater 
than  that  of  Socrates,  when  he  endorsed  the  words  of 
Pindar  :  TovZ  cpvaioXoyovvrai  sq)7],  dreXr/  ffocpia? 
6p£7t£(j^ai  HapTTov.*  It  is  not  only  that  Nature  has 
revealed  to  us  two  infinities,  one  stretching  infinitely 
above,  the  other  sinking  infinitely  beneath  us  ; — infinite 
Space  crowded  with  unnumbered  worlds,  infinite  Time 
peopled  by  unnumbered  existences,  infinite  organisms, 
hitherto  invisible,  but  full  of  delicate  and  iridescent 
loveliness.  It  is  not  only  that  Iris  has  been  the  daughter 
of  Thaumas — not  only  that  Science  has  "  begun  in 
wonder,  and  ended  in  wonder,  while  admiration  filled 
up  the  interspace  " — but  also  that  she  has  been  as  a 
great  Archangel  of  Mercy  devoting  herself  to  the  ser- 
vice of  mankind.  Her  votaries  have  labored  not  to 
increase  the  power  of  despots,  or  add  to  the  magnifi- 
cence of  courts,  but  to  extend  human  happiness,  to 
economize  human  effort,  to  extinguish  human  pain. 
In  little  things  and  iu  great  she  has  alike  striven  to 
serve  us.  She  has  enlisted  the  sunbeam  in  her  service 
to  limn  for  us  with  absolute  fidelity  the  faces  of  our 
friends.  She  has  enabled  the  miner  to  work  in  light 
and  safety  in  the  heart  of  the  earth,  protected  by  so 
delicate  a  medium  as  a  wire  gauze  from  a  force  as  terrific 
as  the  earthquake.  Where  of  old,  men  toiled,  half- 
blinded  and  half-naked,  in  the  mouth  of  the  glowing 
furnace  to  mix  the  white-hot  iron,  she  now  substitutes 


*  He  said  that  the  students  of  physics  culled  a  valueless  fruit  of 
wisdom. 


Modern  Education.  255 


the  mechanical  action  of  the  viewless  air.  She  has  by 
her  anaesthetics  enabled  the  sulierer  to  lie  hushed  and 
unconscious  as  an  infant  on  the  mother's  breast,  while 
in  the  operation  known  as  iridectomy,  the  fine  lancet  of 
some  skilled  operator  cuts  a  fragment  from  tlie  nervous 
circle  of  the  unquivering  eye.  She  points  not  to  pyr- 
amids built  during  weary  centuries  by  the  sweat  of 
miserable  nations,  but  to  the  light-house  and  the  steam- 
ship, the  railroad  and  the  telegraph.  She  has  restored 
eyes  to  the  blind  and  hearing  to  the  deaf.  She  has 
lengthened  life,  she  has  minimized  danger,  she  has  miti- 
gated madness,  she  has  trampled  on  disease.  And  on 
all  these  grounds  a  University  is  to  be  congratulated 
which  provides  such  splendid  opportunities  for  studies 
which  at  once  train  the  reason  and  fire  the  imagination, 
which  can  fashion  as  well  as  forge,  which  can  feed  as 
well  as  fill  the  mind.  Such  studies  to  all  their  faithful 
votaries  are 

"  Not  harsh  and  rugged  as  dull  fools  suppose, 
But  musical  as  is  Apollo's  lute. 
And  a  perpetual  feast  of  nectared  sweets, 
Where  no  crude  surfeit  reigns. " 

12.  But  I  must  not  conclude  without  saying  that, 
whether  the  education  of  our  youth  be  an  education  in 
Science  or  an  education  in  Language,  whether  it  be 
mainly  occupied  with  the  secrets  of  nature  or  with  the 
soul  of  man,  or — which  is  better  still — with  both,  we 
must  ever  bear  steadily  in  mind  what  is  the  end  and  aim 
of  all  education.  "There  are  some,"  says  St.  Bernard, 
"who  seek  to  know  only  that  they  may  know,  and  it  is 
base  curiosity ;  and  some  who  wish  to  know  only  that 
they  may  be  known,  and  it  is  base  vanity ;  and  some 


256  Modern  Education. 


who  wish  to  know  only  that  they  may  sell  their  knowl- 
edge, and  it  is  base  covetousness.  But  there  are  some 
also  who  wish  to  know  that  they  may  edify,  and  it  is 
charity  ;  and  some  who  wish  to  know  that  they  may 
be  edified,  and  it  is  heavenly  prudence."  In  other 
words,  the  object  of  education  is  neither  for  amuse- 
ment, nor  for  bread,  nor  for  fame,  nor  for  controversy, 
nor  for  profit,  but  that  we  may  know  God  here  and 
glorify  Him  forever  in  Heaven  hereafter.  Our  own 
great  Verulam  has  warned  us  that  our  studies  are  meant 
neither  as  "a  couch  on  which  to  rest,  nor  as  a  cloister  in 
which  to  promenade  alone,  nor  as  a  tower  from  which  to 
look  down  on  others,  nor  as  a  fortress  whence  we  may 
resist  them,  nor  as  a  workshop  for  gain  and  merchandise, 
but  as  a  rich  armory  and  treasure-house  for  the  glory  of 
the  Creator  and  the  ennoblement  of  life."  We  learn 
and  study  in  order  that  we  may  be  profitable  members 
of  the  Church  and  Commonwealth,  and  hereafter  par- 
takers of  the  immortal  glory  of  the  Kesurrection  ;  *'  that 
after  having  toiled  in  God's  work  with  the  sweat  of  our 
brow,  we  may  at  last  become  partakers  of  His  Vision 
and  of  His  Sabbath. "  Behind  the  clerk,  behind  the 
merchant,  behind  the  scholar,  behind  the  member  of  the 
learned  profession,  stands  the  man — the  man  made  in 
God's  image — the  far-reaching  intellect,  the  noble  heart, 
the  eternal  being — 

"  Mind  that  looks  before  and  after, 
Seeking  for  its  home  above, 
Human  tears  and  human  laughter. 
And  the  depth  of  human  love." 


Above  the  mere  needs  of  living  towers  the  supreme 


Modern  Education.  257 


awfulness  of  life.  Nothing  is  more  fatal  than  propter 
mtam  vivendi  perdere  causas.  "Whatever  withdraws 
us  from  the  power  of  the  senses,  whatever  makes  the 
past,  the  distant,  and  the  future  predominate  over  the 
passing  interests  of  the  present,  advances  us  in  the 
dignity  of  human  beings,"  and  to  do  this  is  the  ob- 
ject of  education.  That  object,  therefore,  is  to  train 
not  the  mind  only,  or  the  body,  but  also  the  spirit, 
which  is  the  noblest  part  of  man.  When  General  Gar- 
field was  asked,  as  a  young  boy,  "  what  he  meant  to  be," 
he  answered  :  "First  of  all  I  must  make  myself  a  man  ; 
if  I  do  not  succeed  in  that,  I  can  succeed  in  nothing." 
"Before  I  go  any  further,"  says  Frank  Osbaldistone,  in 
Eob  Roy,  "  I  must  know  who  you  are."  "I  am  a  man," 
is  the  answer,  "  and  my  purpose  is  friendly."  "  A  man," 
he  replied;  "that  is  a  brief  description."  "It  will 
serve,"  answered  Rob  Eoy,  "for  one  who  has  no  other 
to  give.  He  that  is  without  name,  without  friends, 
without  coin,  without  country,  is  still  at  least  a  man ; 
and  he  that  has  all  these  is  no  more."  What,  then,  is 
the  best  education  for  a  man  ?  "That  man,"  says  one 
of  the  most  eminent  leaders  of  modern  science,  "has 
bad  a  liberal  education  who  has  been  so  trained  in  youth 
that  his  body  is  the  ready  servant  of  his  will  ;  whose  in- 
tellect is  a  clear,  cold  logic- engine,  ready  alike  to  spin 
the  gossamers  and  forge  t\\a  anchors  of  the  mind  ;  whose 
mind  is  stored  with  a  knowledge  of  the  great  and  funda- 
mental trutlis  of  nature  ;  one  who,  no  stunted  ascetic, 
is  full  of  life  and  fire,  but  whose  passions  are  trained  to 
come  to  heel  by  a  strong  will  the  servant  of  a  tender 
conscience  ;  wiio  has  learned  to  love  all  beauty,  whether 
of  nature  or  of  art,  to  hate  all  vileuess,  and  to  respect 
17 


258  Modern  Education. 


others  as  himself."  But  these  blessed  and  glorious  re- 
sults are  not  attainable  without  a  training  of  the  spirit. 
We  have  bodies,  but  we  are  spirits.  "We  live  by  ad- 
miration, hope,  love."  "  Man  doth  not  live  by  bread 
alone,  but  by  every  word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the 
mouth  of  God."  Nothing  but  Religion  in  one  or  other 
of  its  great  essential  forms  can  make  us  through  all  our 
lives  faithful  to  the  best  we  know — faithful  to  God, 
faithful  to  our  country,  faithful  to  our  fellow-men,  and 
to  ourselves.  Our  education  must  be,  like  the  ancient 
temples,  lighted  at  the  top.  That  education  will  lead 
us  to  the  only  true  happiness,  and  to  the  only  real  and 
permanent  success. 

"  Take  thou  no  thought  for  aught  but  truth  and  right. 
Content,  if  such  thy  fate,  to  die  obscure; 
Youth  fails  and  honors  ;  fame  may  not  endure ; 
And  loftier  souls  soon  weary  of  delight. 
Keep  innocence  ;  be  all  a  true  man  ought, 
Let  neither  pleasure  tempt  nor  pain  appal  : 
Who  hath  this,  he  hath  all  things  having  naught ; 
Who  hath  it  not,  hath  nothing  having  all." 


ADDRESS  II. 


A  Paper  Read  at  the  Church  Congress  in  New  Haven, 
October  20,  1885. 


atonement. 


I  SUPPOSE  that  the  subject  of  this  discussion  has 
purposely  been  left  a  little  vague ;  but  I  will  venture, 
quite  plainly  and  fearlessly,  with  no  reserves,  with  no 
subterfuges,  to  tell  you  my  exact  thoughts  on  the  sub- 
ject, thoughts  which  I  have  always  freely  stated,  and 
which,  during  a  course  of  many  years,  have  never  seen 
due  cause  to  change. 

Faith  in  the  Atonement — the  belief  that  Christ  lived 
and  died  for  us,  and  that  by  his  life  and  death  we  are 
saved — is  an  essential  part  of  our  common  Christianity. 
It  is  the  key  of  the  evangelical  position.  In  this  faith 
all  who  profess  and  call  themselves  Christians  are 
united  ;  without  this  faith  the  Gospel  is  robbed  of  its 
most  central  meaning  and  message. 

1.  Our  faith  in  the  Atonement  is  based  on  the  revela- 
tion contained  in  the  Scriptures,  and  especially  in  the 
New  Testament,  confirmed  by  the  inward  witness  of 


26o  Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement. 

God's  spirit  in  our  hearts.  If  we  desire  fit  words  wherein 
to  express  it,  we  look  first  and  naturally  to  Holy  Script- 
ure. There,  iu  many  different  phrases,  we  read  that 
"  Christ  died  for  our  sins  ;  "  that  "  He  suffered  for  our 
sins,  the  just  for  the  unjust ;  "  that  "  He  was  sacrificed 
for  us  ; "  that  "  He  was  made  sin  for  us  ;  "  that  "  He 
made  his  soul  an  offering  for  sin ;  "  that  "  He  put  away 
sin  by  the  sacrifice  of  Himself  ;  "  that  "by  one  offering 
He  hath  perfected  forever  them  that  are  sanctified  ; " 
that  "He  is  the  propitiation  for  our  sins,  and  not  for 
ours  only,  but  also  for  the  sins  of  the  whole  world;" 
that  "He  hath  reconciled  us  to  God  by  his  blood;"  that 
"He  gave  his  life  a  ransom  for  many  ;  "  that  "He  re- 
deemed us  to  God  by  his  own  blood  ; "  that  "  His  blood 
was  shed  for  many  for  the  remission  of  sins  ;  "  that  "  He 
hath  washed  us  from  our  sios  in  his  own  blood  ; "  and 
that  "His  blood  cleanseth  from  all  sin."  There  are 
three  special  passages  in  which  St.  Paul  states  our  faith 
in  the  Atonement.  In  Romans  iii.  21-26,  he  says  that, 
being  all  guilty,  "  we  are  justified  freely  by  God's  grace 
through  the  redemption  that  is  in  Jesus  Christ,"  In 
2  Cor.  v.  19-21,  he  says  that  "God  was  in  Christ  rec- 
onciling the  world  unto  Himself,  not  reckoning  unto 
them  their  trespasses."  In  Gal.  iii.  13,  14,  he  says  that 
"  Christ  purchased  us  from  the  curse  of  the  Law,  having 
become  a  curse  for  us."  And  all  these  statements,  which 
declare  the  fact  of  the  Atonement,  and  the  reconciliation 
of  man  to  God,  we  steadfastly  believe. 

2.  We  turn  to  the  Creeds  of  Christendom ;  and  there, 
too,  we  find  the  Atonement  stated  simply  as  a  fact.  In 
the  Apostles'  Creed,  after  expressing  our  belief  in  the 
Incarnation,  Death,  and  Kesurrection  of  Christ,  we  add 


Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement.  261 

our  belief  in  "  the  forgiveness  of  sins."  In  the  Nicene 
Creed  we  say  that  the  life  and  death  of  Christ  were 
"  for  us  men  and  for  our  salvation."  In  the  much  later 
Athauasian  Creed,  so  full  and  so  precise  on  the  doctrines 
of  the  Trinity  and  the  Incarnation,  we  sum  up  the 
Atonement  in  the  single  clause  that  Christ  "  suffered 
for  our  salvation."  And  all  this  we  steadfastly  be- 
lieve. 

3.  We  turn  to  the  Articles  of  our  Church.  In  the 
second  we  find  that  Christ  died  "to  reconcile  his  Father 
to  us  " — "  ut  nobis  reconciliaret  Patrem  "  (an  unscript- 
ural  phrase  of  the  Augsburg  Confession  for  "  that  He 
might  reconcile  us  to  the  Father") — and  to  be  a  sacri- 
fice not  only  for  original  guilt,  but  also  for  actual  sins 
of  men.  In  the  seventh  article  we  confess  that  "  He  is 
the  only  Mediator  between  God  and  man,  being  both 
God  and  man."  In  the  fourteenth  that  "He  came  to 
be  the  Lamb  without  spot,  who,  by  sacrifice  of  Himself 
once  made,  should  take  away  the  sin  of  the  world." 
In  the  eighteenth,  that  His  is  "  the  only  name  under 
heaven  whereby  we  must  be  saved."  In  all  these  pas- 
sages the  doctrine  of  the  Atonement  is  the  simple  state- 
ment, mostly  in  Scripture  language,  of  the  fact  of  the 
Atonement.  If  we  turn  to  the  Tridentine  Catechism, 
we  find  exactly  the  same  facts  insisted  on.  The  benefits 
of  the  Atonement  are  clearly  stated  ;  of  theory  respect- 
ing it,  there  is  no  trace.  It  is  rather  deliberately  ex- 
cluded in  the  words  that  its  efficacy  consisted  in  its 
being  "  a  full  and  entire  satisfaction  offered,  after  a 
certain  admirable  manner,  to  the  Father."  And  all  this 
we  steadfastly  believe. 

4.  This,  then,  is  the  Christian  belief  in  the  Atone- 


262  Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement, 

ment,  which  is  sometimes  meant  by  the  doctrine  of  the 
Atonement.  On  the  other  hand,  by  "the  doctrine  of 
the  Atonement"  is  often  meant  some  systematic  theory 
of  the  Atonement ;  some  theological  philosophy  of  the 
Atonement ;  some  scholastic  theodiccBa  of  the  Atone- 
ment, summarized  in  the  shibboleth  of  this  or  that  sect 
or  section  of  the  Christian  Cluirch  ;  and,  when  we  enter 
on  the  consideration  of  these,  we  are  no  longer  on  the 
solid  shore  of  Christian  unity,  but  are  launched  on  the 
stormy  and  open  sea  of  controversy  and  difference. 

5.  I  say  at  once,  and  without  fear  of  contradiction, 
that  no  theory  of  the  Atonement  ever  formulated,  no 
scholastic  explanation  of  the  Atonement  ever  devised, 
has  been  accepted  by  the  Universal  Church,  or  can  put 
forth  the  slightest  claim  to  catholicity.  I  now  only 
state  the  facts  ;  I  wiU  afterward  glance  at  the  reasons 
why  it  is  so. 

I.  The  fact  is  sufficiently  proved  and  admitted  in 
every  history  of  doctrines  ever  written.  The  writings  of 
the  Ante-Nicene  Fathers  on  these  subjects  are  entirely 
unsystematic,  and  only  quote  the  current  Scriptural 
phrases.  The  main  exception  is  Irenseus.  In  him  is 
first  found— for  his  language  on  the  subject  appears  to 
me  wholly  unambiguous — the  disastrous  theory  that  the 
ransom  which  Christ  paid  was  paid  to  Satan.  This 
unhappy  theory,  so  dishonoring  to  God,  so  closely  allied 
to  Gnosticism  and  dualism,  can  put  forth  a  stronger 
claim  to  universality  than  any  other  ;  for  it  lasted 
almost  unquestioned  for  nearly  a  thousand  years.  It 
was  not  only  adopted  by  Origen,  but  by  him,  unhappily, 
systematized  and  supplemented.  He  was  the  earliest 
to  suggest  the  still  more  baseless  and  God-dishonoring 


Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement.  263 

fancy  that  Satan  was  tricked  into  acceptance  of  this 
ransom  by  our  Lord's  Incarnation — a  notion  which, 
though  to  us  it  seems4ittle  short  of  blasphemous,  is  re- 
peated even  by  such  writers  as  Ambrose,  and  down  even 
to  the  Sentences  of  Peter  Lombard,  which  were  the  one 
chief  theological  manual  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The 
genius  of  one  man — of  the  great  St.  Anselm — destroyed 
this  deeply-rooted  theory  at  a  single  blow,  by  showing 
that  it  involved  nothing  short  of  pure  Manicheeism.  He 
substituted  for  it  the  forensic  theory  of  rigid  equivalent 
satisfaction.  This  theory,  too,  had  its  day,  and  has 
fallen  into  a  neglect  so  complete  that  not  a  trace  of 
it  is  to  be  found  in  thousands  of  modern  sermons  and 
volumes  of  theology. 

Then  came  the  Reformation  theories  of  "substitu- 
tion," of  "imputation,"  of  "vicarious  punishment." 
Then  came  the  juristic  scheme  of  the  legist,  Grotius. 
Now,  though  each  of  these  schemes  or  theories  counts 
many  nominal  adherents — though  each  of  them  claims 
to  be  a  legitimate  inference  from  some  phrases  or  frag- 
ment of  Scripture — they  are  very  rarely  brought  into 
prominence,  and  not  one  of  them  has  ever  been  accred- 
ited or  stamped  with  approval  by  the  Church  of  God. 
They  have,  at  the  utmost,  been  left  as  permissible  opin- 
ions or  conjectures  in  the  region  of  unfathomable  mys- 
teries. They  all  abound  in  terms  which,  at  the  best,  are 
but  inferential  and  n  on -scriptural.  Neither  "  vicari- 
ous," nor  "substitution,"  nor  "satisfaction,"  nor  "ex- 
piation "  occurs  in  the  New  Testament ;  nor  is  it  any- 
where said  that  Christ  saved  us  from  the  punishment  of 
sin ;  or  that  His  own  death  was  a  penalty.  Even  the 
phrase  "  God  for  Christ's  sake  forgave  "  is  a  mistrans- 


264  Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement. 

lation  of  our  Authorized  Version,  for  the  infinitely 
deeper  and  diviner  expression  of  St.  Paul,  "  God  in 
Christ  forgave."  Even  if  the  theories  involved  in  these 
phrases  be  regarded  as  tenable,  or  even  inevitable,  it  is 
certain  that  the  popular  expositions  of  them — by  which 
alone  the  mass  of  Christians  can  judge — are  open  to  the 
strongest  objection,  and  are  regarded  by  many  as  involv- 
ing nothing  less  then  a  needless  stumbling-block  and  a 
shock  to  the  moral  sense.  When  we  are  told  in  hymns 
by  Dr.  Watts, 

"Rich  were  the  drops  of  Jesu's  blood 
That  calmed  God's  frowning  face  ; 
That  sprinkled  o'er  the  burning  throne 
And  turned  the  wrath  to  grace  ; " 

or,  by  Sir  Henry  Wotton,  that 

"  One  rosy  drop  from  Jesu's  heart 
Was  worlds  of  seas  to  quench  God's  ire  ;  " 

or,  in  sermons,  by  a  well-known  English  preacher,  that 
Jesus  "  wiped  away  the  red  anger-spot  from  the  brow  of 
God  ; "  or,  by  an  American  Professor,  that  "  God  drew 
this  world  upon  Calvary  and  slew  his  only  Son  ;"  or,  by 
another  popular  divine,  that  "  Christ  at  one  tremendous 
draught  drank  damnation  dry  ;  "  when  an  American 
criminal,  at  the  foot  of  the  gallows,  trained  in  such 
forms  of  dogma,  talked  to  the  crowd  about  "holding 
up  the  blood  of  Christ  between  himself  and  the  flaming 
face  of  God  " — such  language  not  only  sounds  abhor- 
rent to  many,  but  is  in  flagrant  disaccord  with  the  num- 
berless revelations  which  tell  us  that  the  Atonement  was 
due  to  the  Father's  love.  In  popular  apprehension,  at 
any  rate,  all  such  theories  are  dangerously  tainted  with 


Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement.  265 

the  heresies  of  sheer  Tritheism  ;  of  most  unscripturally 
contrasting  the  Son's  love  with  the  Father's  wrath  ; 
of  implying  a  civil  war,  so  to  speak,  between  the  at- 
tributes of  justice  and  mercy  in  the  character  of  God  ; 
of  attributing  to  the  All-just,  the  All-merciful,  the  All- 
holy,  the  acceptance  of  mere  legal  fictions  to  appease 
an  implacable  demand  for  vengeance ;  of  imagining  a 
divergence  of  will  in  the  Holy  Trinity;  of  dishonoring 
God  by  thinking  that  he  is  altogether  such  an  one  as 
ourselves,  by  speaking  of  him  ignobly  as  though  he  were 
an  Evil  Demiurge,  demanding  sanguinary  propitiation,  op 
a  Pagan  Deity  controlled  by  some  overruling  necessity. 

II.  And  the  cause  of  all  these  errors  is  obvious.  They 
spring  from  ignoring  the  fact  that  it  has  not  pleased 
God  to  give  us  the  plan  of  salvation  in  dialectics  ;  from 
the  bad  tendency  to  torture  isolated  expressions  into  the 
ever- widening  spiral  ergo  of  unlimited  consequen,.  ,s ; 
from  tessellating  varied  metaphors  into  formal  systems  ; 
from  ti7ing  to  construct  the  whole,  when  God  has  only 
given  us  knowledge  of  a  part ;  fi'om  the  bad  rule  of  ec- 
clesiastical opinionativeness  and  tyranny  consequenticB 
(Bquipollent  revelatis. 

Now  we  should  be  secure  from  the  temptation  of  fall- 
ing into  such  errors,  and  of  so  placing  the  stumbling- 
blocks  of  our  subjective  idols  before  the  unsuspecting 
childhood  of  the  world,  if  we  would  but  humbly  learn 
the  force  of  that  wise  admonition  of  the  Rabbis:  "  Learn 
to  say  '  I  do  not  know.'  "  The  Scripture  speaks  of  the 
Atonement  almost  exclusively  in  metaphors  ;  and  we 
might  at  least  admit  the  Church  rule,  Tlieologia  para- 
holica  non  est  demonstrativa.  Apart  from  the  figures 
of  purification  by  sprinkling,  and  the  covering  of  filthy 


266  Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement. 


robes,  all  the  figures  in  which  Holy  Scripture  speaks  of 
the  Atonement  are  reducible  under  the  four  words, 
iXaGjxoi,  "an  atoning  sacrifice;"  KaraXXayi],  "  & 
reconciliation ;  "  avriXvrpor,  "a  ransom  from  slavery," 
and  "satisfaction,"  or  the  discharge  of  a  debt,  for  which 
there  is  no  single  Greek  word.  But  the  analogy  of  all 
Scripture  language  should  teach  us  that  these  words  are 
only  meant  to  describe  the  effects  of  the  Atonement  in 
its  relation  to  man.  Theorizing  on  the  word  xaraX- 
Xayrj  led  to  the  false  conception  of  our  Father  as  our 
enemy  ;  theorizing  on  the  word  avri'Xvrpov  led  to  the 
false  conception  of  Irenaeus,  Origen,  and  hosts  of  Fathers 
and  Schoolmen  about  a  compact,  and  even  a  fraudful 
compact,  between  God  and  Satan  ;  theorizing  on  the 
word  "  satisfaction  "  led  to  the  hard  forensic  schemes  of 
Anselm,  and  of  Grotius;  theorizing  on  the  word  iXaff/Aoi 
led  to  all  the  false  and  revolting  expressions  which  have 
been  ingrafted  by  popular  ignorance  on  the  teaching  of 
the  Reformers.  In  the  word  iXaapio?  alone,  there  is 
the  same  dimly-apprehended  mystery  which  lies  in  the 
Jewisli  system  of  sacrifice  ;  but  neither  in  that  system — 
about  which  Christian  theologians  have  held  the  most 
conflicting  views — nor  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  is 
there  any  answer  to  the  question  of  Episcopius  about 
the  Atonement,  "An  circa  Deum  aliquid  effecerit?" 
Of  that  mystery — the  effect  of  the  Atonement  as  regards 
God — we  can  only  say  that  it  is  wholly  beyond  the  com- 
prehension of  our  finite  faculties — Ignorando  cognosci- 
iur.  Of  the  blessed  effects  of  the  Atonement  in  rela- 
tion to  man  we  know,  or  may  know  all  ;  of  the  mys- 
terious acts,  of  the  operative  cause,  we  know  and  can 
know  nothing.   This  is  what  the  Church  clearly  teaches 


Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement.  267 

us,  alike  by  what  she  does  say  and  by  what  she  carefully 
abstains  from  saying.  It  has  been  the  ultimate  conclu- 
sion arrived  at  by  many  of  the  greatest  modern  theolo- 
gians, both  dead  and  living — by  men,  for  instance,  so 
entirely  different  as  Canon  Mozley  and  Professor  Mau- 
rice ;  and  it  is  also  the  direct  teaching  of  the  great 
divine  whom  of  all  others  the  English  Church  has  most 
delighted  to  honor,  "  Scripture,"  says  Bishop  Butler, 
"  has  left  this  matter  of  the  satisfaction  of  Christ  mys- 
terious, left  somewhat  in  it  unrevealed,"  so  that  "all 
conjecture  about  it  must  be,  if  not  evidently  absurd,  at 
least  uncertain. " 

While,  then,  we  humbly  put  our  sole  trust  in  Christ, 
and  look  on  His  Atonement  as  the  sole  source  of  our 
hope,  we  are  not  obliged  to  accept  any  of  the  theories 
of  men  respecting  it,  whether  those  of  Irenaeus,  or  of 
Origen,  or  of  Anselm,  or  of  Grotius,  or  of  Calvin  ; 
whether  they  be  formulated  as  naked  substitution  or  vi- 
carious punishment,  or  whatsoever  else.  We  accept  only 
what  the  Scriptures  have  plainly  said  and  what  has  been 
stamped  with  the  approval  of  the  Universal  Church. 
We  cannot  construct  compact  and  elaborate  systems  out 
of  transcendent  and  varying  metaphors.  Nothing  but 
failure  can  come,  or  has  ever  come,  of  the  attempt  to 
fathom  the  depths  of  God  with  the  finger  of  man — the 
attempts  to  fly  up  into  the  secrets  of  the  Deity  on  the 
waxen  wings  of  the  understanding. 

This,  then,  we  say  and  earnestly  believe  :  that  Christ's 
death  is  the  means  of  our  life;  that  it  is  an  atoning  sac- 
rifice for  us  ;  that  in  that  act  God  was  in  Christ  recon- 
ciling the  world  unto  himself,  that  it  was  the  appointed 
means  of  our  deliverance,  of  our  regeneration,  of  our 


268  Christian  Doctrine  of  the  Atonement. 


sanctification,  of  our  hope  of  glory.  And  to  all  ■who 
would  frame  elaborate  systems  beyond  this,  it  seems  to 
me  that  the  Church  of  God,  alike  by  her  teaching  and 
by  her  silence,  addresses  the  wise  rebuke  of  St.  Chrys- 
ostom,  raWa  fxr]  7rspiEpya2,ov.  The  infinitely  blessed 
results  of  Christ's  redemption  we  know.  They  alone 
concern  us.  They  are  the  joy  and  the  thanksgiving  of 
our  life.  Of  the  mystery  as  regards  the  mind  of  God 
we  can  only  say  that  "  the  supreme  expression  of  God's 
government  of  man  is  the  consciousness  of  humanity ; 
nor  have  we  any  means  of  apprehending  the  reasons  of 
the  Atonement  apart  from  the  work  which  it  accom- 
plishes in  the  spiritual  consciousness  of  the  race." 
"The  mysterious  act,"  says  the  great  Christian  philoso- 
pher to  whom  English  theology  is  so  deeply  indebted, 
"is  transcendent,  factum  est;  and,  beyond  the  infor- 
mation contained  in  the  enunciation  of  the  fact,  it  can 
only  be  characterized" — as  Scripture  characterizes  it — 
**by  its  consequences  as  regards  ourselves." 


ADDRESS  III. 


Deutered  at  the  Church  Congress  in  New  Haven,  October, 

1885. 


Cl^e  (I5rounl)?i  of  €t^ti^tian  dlnitv* 


The  first  gronnd  of  Christian  unity — unity  in  heart 
and  soul  amid  divergences  of  opinion  and  variations 
of  practice — is  the  many-sidedness  of  truth. 

We  must  draw  a  deep  distinction  between  unity  and 
uniformity.  Unity  is  essential  and  obligatory  ;  uni- 
formity is  impossible,  and  even,  I  will  venture  to  say, 
undesirable.  Infinite  truth  has  manifold  aspects  for 
finite  understandings.  To  use  the  splendid  expression 
of  St.  Paul,  it  is  a  noXvnoiHiXo?  ffocpia,  a  "  many- 
colored,"  a  "  richly  variegated-wisdom."  The  Church,  to 
use  the  ancient  phrase,  is  "  circumamicta  varietatibus" 
clothed  in  raiment  of  divers  colors  ;  and  the  truth  she 
teaches  does  not  shine  in  a  single  light  only,  but  is  like 
a  gem  of  which  no  eye  can  see  at  once  the  glories  of 
each  separate  facet.  We  see  the  separate  colors  of  the 
divine  rainbow  ;  we  cannot  see  the  seven-fold  perfection 
of  its  undivided  light. 

Truth,  in  theology,  no  less  than  in  science,  has  been 
revealed  to  us,  as  we  are  told  in  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews,  noXvfxepcoi  xai  no\vxp6n(jo<i,  "fragmenta- 


270    The  Grounds  of  Christian  Unity. 

rily  and  multifariously,"  "in  many  parts  and  in  many 
manners  ; "  nor  is  it  possible  for  us,  with  our  human 
limitations,  to  see  it  steadily  and  see  it  whole.  And 
this  a  jsKori  certainty  is  confirmed  by  experience.  As 
an  historic  fact,  there  never  has  been,  in  the  Christian 
Church,  a  complete  absence  of  different  schools  of 
thought ;  there  never  has  been  an  absolute  uniformity 
of  belief  and  of  practice.  K  it  did  not  exist  in  the 
Church  of  Jerusalem,  why  should  we  expect  it  to  exist 
in  the  churches  of  Europe  ?  If  in  the  first  century 
there  were  the  schools  of  Jerusalem,  of  Antioch,  and  of 
Alexandria,  is  it  likely  that  there  will  be  no  wide  differ- 
ences of  views  and  ritual  amid  the  immense  complexities 
of  modern  Christendom  ? 

If  this  fact  had  been  duly  apprehended,  churches  and 
their  rulers  might  have  been  saved  from  their  disas- 
trous attempts  to  secure  what  is  impossible.  Those  at- 
tempts in  many  an  age  have  not  only  marred  the  beauty 
and  maimed  the  force  of  Christian  life,  but  they  have 
led  to  the  darkest  and  deadliest  crimes  which  have  ever 
disgraced  the  corporate  action  of  the  Church  of  God ; 
to  Albigensian  Crusades,  to  Smithfield  martyrdoms,  to 
the  infamies  of  the  Inquisition,  to  the  desperate  iniqui- 
ties which  have  been  committed  by  religious  tyranny  in 
its  endeavor  to  storm  that  conscience  of  man  which 
is  the  very  citadel  of  Heaven.  And  this  error  of  invin- 
cible ignorance,  so  far  from  being  successful  even  at 
the  hideous  cost  of  Moloch-sacrifice,  has  only  produced, 
at  the  most,  a  nominal,  a  Laodicean,  a  stupid  and 
uninquiring  uniformity — a  uniformity  which  warred 
against  all  freedom  and  all  progress — a  silence  of  terror, 
a  torpor  of  assurance,  a  drugged  sleep  of  unnatural 


The  Grounds  of  Christian  Unity.  271 


acquiescence ;  the  uniformity  of  stagnation,  ignorance, 
and  death.  If  diversity  without  unity  be  discord,  on 
the  other  hand,  unity  without  diversity  is  death.  In 
every  living  Church,  in  every  living  nation,  there  must 
be  freedom,  and  there  must  be  progress. 

"  The  old  order  changeth,  giving  place  to  new, 
And  God  fulfils  himseK  in  many  ways. 
Lest  one  good  custom  should  corrupt  the  world." 

St.  Cyprian  was  very  wise  when  he  formulated  the 
maxim,  "  Salvo  jure  communionis  diver sa  sentire." 

Another  ground  of  Christian  unity  is  the  com- 
mand of  Christ  —  Christ's  new  commandment  —  the 
commandment  on  which  hang  all  the  Law  and  the 
Prophets ;  the  commandment  so  often  repeated  on 
the  lips  of  Christians,  so  often  belied  in  their  actions 
— "Love  one  another"  What  has  been  the  sphere 
in  which  disunion  has  chiefly  and  most  dangerously 
worked  ?  Has  it  not  been  in  matters  of  organization, 
in  matters  of  ceremonial,  and  in  matters  of  minor  and 
non-essential  opinion  ?  But  the  discoveries  of  every 
year  are  demonstrating  to  us  more  decisively  that  on 
these  matters  the  widest  latitude  was  left  to  the  Apos- 
tolic Church.  As  to  ceremonial,  St.  Paul's  one  suflS- 
cient  rubric  was  :  "  Let  all  things  be  done  decently  and 
in  order."  As  to  organization,  our  Lord  said,  Other 
sheep  I  have  which  are  not  of  this  fold  ;  them  also  I  must 
bring  that  there  may  be — not  "  one  fold" — which,  per- 
haps, there  never  will  be,  or  was  meant  to  be — but  that 
there  may  be  "  one  flock,  one  shepherd."  As  regards  the 
minor  opinions  which  separate  Christians  into  so  many 
petty  schisms,  we  may  conjecture  how  the  great  Apostle 


272     The  Grou7ids  of  Christian  Unity. 

of  the  Gentiles  would  have  dealt  with  them  when  we  read 
how  he  dealt  with  so  serious  an  error  as  a  denial  of  the 
Kesurrection.  He  dealt  with  it  not  by  anathema,  not  by 
punishment,  still  less  by  excommunication,  but  only  by 
a  solemn  question  and  by  a  glorious  argument.  Sects 
and  parties  have  been  fond  of  hurling  at  each  other  the 
name  of  "heretic;"  but  in  the  New  Testament  the 
word  ai'peGii  means  not  the  aberration  of  opinion,  but 
the  recklessness  of  faction.  The  word  aipsriHoi  has  no 
other  meaning  than  that  of  a  vehement  partisan.  The 
worst  of  all  heresies  in  any  Christian,  and  the  heresy 
which  Christ  holds  as  most  inexcusable,  however  com- 
monly and  however  bitterly  it  betray  itself  in  our  con- 
troversies, is  the  heresy  of  hatred,  is  that  odium  which, 
to  the  eternal  shame  of  our  apostacy  from  the  tender 
forbearance  of  our  Lord,  has  acquired  the  distinctive 
name  of  "  theologicum."  If  a  man  be  animated  by 
that  spirit — be  he  the  most  dreaded  champion  of  his 
shibboleth,  the  foremost  fugleman  of  his  party — if  he 
be  guilty  of  that  heresy,  his  Christianity  is  heathenism, 
his  orthodoxy  a  cloak  for  error.  "  If  a  man  love  not 
his  brother,  whom  he  hath  seen,  how  can  he  love  God 
whom  he  hath  not  seen  ?" 

A  third  ground  of  Christian  unity  is  that  faith  which, 
in  its  highest  sense,  had  to  St.  Paul  no  other  meaning 
than  oneness  with  Christ. 

Theologians  may  write  huge  folios  of  interminable 
dogmatics,  they  may  enlarge  to  infinity  their  personal 
inferences  from  single  texts,  and  so  may  foist  into  our 
temples  their  own  idols  of  the  forum,  of  the  theatre,  and 
of  the  cave ;  nevertheless,  it  remains  certain  that  the 
great,  eternal,  essential  truths  of  Christianity  are  few  and 


The  Grounds  of  Christian  Unity.  273 

simple,  so  few  and  so  simple  that  they  may  be  written 
upon  the  palm  of  the  hand.  "  They  ask  me  for  secrets 
of  salvation,"  said  St.  Francis  de  Sales.  "For  myself  I 
know  no  secrets  but  this — to  love  God  with  all  our  hearts, 
and  our  neighbor  as  ourselves." 

The  terms  of  our  fellowship  of  love  should  be  Catho- 
lic, as  the  Church  of  God.  The  railing  restrictions 
which  fence  in  as  with  razors  and  pitchforks  the  narrow 
wicket  of  parties,  and  would  fain  make  the  portal  of 
the  Church  itself  bristle  with  anathemas,  are  unevan- 
gelic,  unapostolic,  unchristian.  The  more  we  are 
Christians  the  more  vrill  our  faith  "  be  broad  with  the 
breadth  of  the  charity  of  Almighty  God,  and  narrow  only 
with  the  narrowness  of  his  righteousness."  To  those  who 
tried  at  Corinth  to  foster  party  spirit,  and  draw  party 
distinctions,  St.  Paul  addressed  the  indignant  question, 
jxifxipiarai  6  XpiGToi;  "Has  Christ  been  parcelled 
into  fragments?"  Will  you  dare  to  inscribe  his  name 
on  the  ignoble  fluttering  pennons  of  a  party,  and  claim 
them  as  the  eternal  semper  eadem  of  the  Church  of  God? 
Wise  was  the  answer  of  the  old  Cliristian  Bishop,  when 
he  was  asked  to  what  party  he  belonged,  "  Christianus 
miJii  nomen  est  Catliolicus  cognomen."  Partisans  are 
ever  ready  to  say  with  the  Sons  of  Thunder,  "  We  for- 
bade him  because  he  folio weth  not  after  us; "  but  Christ's 
answer  was,  "Forbid  him  not."  Fatal  will  it  be  to  any 
Church  to  prefer  the  Elijah  spirit  which  calls  down  tire 
from  heaven  to  the  Christ  spirit  which  forbears  and 
forgives.  The  brother  whom  we  are  tempted  to  mis- 
represent, to  embitter,  to  dislike,  and  to  denounce,  is 
he  not  one  with  us  in  the  law  of  duty,  one  in  the  aim  of 
life,  one  in  the  earnestness  of  prayer,  one  in  the  grace 
18 


274     The  Grounds  of  Christian  Unity. 


of  the  holy  sacraments,  one  in  the  great  ancient  creeds 
of  the  Gospel  ?  Our  differences  are  but  the  varying 
ripples  of  the  sea,  our  unity  as  the  ocean's  unseen  bed. 
It  is  the  unity  of  one  body  and  one  Spirit,  and  one  hope 
of  our  calling,  one  Lord,  one  faith,  one  baptism,  one 
God  and  Father  of  all,  who  is  above  all  and  through  all 
and  in  us  all.  In  these  lies  the  unity  of  Christian 
love.  The  politician  of  the  party,  the  Goliath  of  the 
faction,  the  controversalist  of  the  sect,  delight  to  exacer- 
bate minor  differences;  but  the  soul  which  is  calm  and 
strong,  and  joyful  in  God, 

"  Remembering  our  dear  Lord  who  died  for  all, 
And  musing  on  the  little  lives  of  men, 
And  how  they  mar  that  little  by  their  feuds," 

will  feel  that  a  cup  of  cold  water,  a  grasp  of  friendship, 
a  word  of  sympathy  given  in  Christ's  name  to  one  of 
Christ's  disciples  who  followeth  not  after  us,  is  better 
than  a  barren  assent  to  the  whole  Summa  Theologies, 
and  that  what  the  Lord  requires  of  us  is  not  sacrifice, 
but  mercy ;  that  it  is  to  do  justly,  and  to  love  mercy, 
and  to  walk  humbly  with  our  God. 

The  last  ground  of  Christian  unity  on  which  I  will 
touch  is  that  it  is  essential  to  the  prosperity  of  the  Church 
of  Christ.  While  we  are  disputing  and  wrangling — often 
about  the  uncertain,  often  about  the  infinitely  little — the 
enemy  is  at  our  gates. 

"  What  is  a  town  of  war 
Yet  wild,  the  people's  hearts  brimful  appear. 
To  manage  private  and  domestic  quarrels? 
'Tis  monstrous." 

What  injures  the  cause  of  Christ  is  not  in  the  least 


The  Grounds  of  Christian  Unity.  275 


the  existence  of  differences,  whether  in  practice  or  in 
opinion,  respecting  that  which  is  imperfectly  revealed, 
but  the  mismanagement  of  those  differences ;  not  the 
inevitable  divergences  in  minor  matters  of  opinion,  but 
(what  Melanchthon  was  glad  to  die  that  he  might 
escape)  "the  rage  of  theologians"  respecting  them. 
Our  perils  are  from  within.  What  neither  Atheism 
will  ever  achieve,  nor  Agnosticism,  nor  direct  assault, 
may  be  fatally  accomplished  by  our  internal  dissensions 
and  want  of  mutual  charity.    They  may  subdue  that 

"  Quod  neque  Tydides,  nec  LarisscBus  Achilles, 
Non  anni  domuere  decern,  non  mille  cai-ince." 

St.  Paul  warned  us  of  this  long  ago.  "But  if  ye  bite 
and  devour  one  another,  take  heed  that  ye  be  not  con- 
sumed one  of  another." 

The  best  and  truest  Christians  have  long  ago  learned, 
at  least  in  practice,  the  force  of  these  truths.  Within 
those  limits  of  eternal  certainty 

"  Quos  ultra  citraque  nequit  consistere  rectum," 

no  human  beings  could  have  differed  more  widely  than 
the  stern  Governor  Bradford,  the  saintly  missionary 
Eliot,  and  the  saintly  Jesuit^  Druillettes  ;  yet  the  Jesuit 
was  the  honored  guest  of  the  Puritan  governor,  and  the 
saintly  apostle  of  the  Indians  pressed  him  to  spend  a 
whole  winter  in  his  humble  home.  When  Dr.  Channing 
died  the  members  of  all  religious  denominations  alike 
mourned  for  him,  and  the  bells  of  every  place  of  wor- 
ship were  tolled  for  his  funeral. 

Let  me  end  with  one  or  two  brief  testimonies  from  men 
whose  religious  views  were  wide  as  the  poles  asunder 


276     The  Grounds  of  Christian  Unity. 

"  Summa  nostrm  religionis  Pax  est,"  said  Erasmus. 
"In  necessariis  Unitas,  in  duhiis  Libertas,  in  omnibus 
Caritas,"  said  the  obscure  German  divine  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  Rupertus  Meldenius ;  and  by  that  sen- 
tence alone  he  lives.  "The  meek,  the  just,  the  pious, 
the  devout,"  said  the  founder  of  Pennsylvania,  "are  all 
of  one  religion  ;  and  they  shall  meet  and  recognize  each 
other  when  their  various  masks  and  liveries  are  stripped 
away."  "  When  a  Church  inscribes  on  its  portals," 
said  Abraham  Lincoln,  "  the  two  great  commandments 
of  the  Law  and  the  Gospel,  and  makes  obedience  to  them 
the  test  of  its  membership,  to  that  Church  will  I  belong." 
"Where  there  is  the  love  of  God,"  said  the  great  and 
eloquent  Lacordaire,  "  there  is  Jesus  Christ ;  and  where 
there  is  Jesus  Christ,  there  is  the  Church  with  him." 

"  The  tiTie  religion  sprung  from  God  above, 

Is  like  its  fountain,  full  of  charity  ; 
Embracing  all  things  with  a  tender  love, 

Full  of  good-will,  and  meek  expectancy  ; 

Pull  of  true  justice,  and  sure  verity ; 
In  voice  and  heart  free,  large,  ev'n  infinite  ; 

Not  wedged  in  strait  particularity. 
But  grasping  all  things  in  her  free,  active  spirit. 
Bright  lamp  of  God  I   Oh !  that  all  men  could  joy 

In  thy  pure  light !" 


ADDEESS  IV. 


Delivered  at  The  Tempeeance  Reception,  Chickebuig  Hall, 
New  York,  Octobek  29,  1885. 


Ladies  and  Gentlemen : 

I  MUST,  first  of  all,  thank  you  from  my  heart  for  this 
far  too  kind  and  generous  recognition  of  such  poor 
efforts  as  I  have  been  enabled  to  make  in  the  cause  of 
Temperance.  Your  appreciation  will  be  to  me  the 
strongest  outward  incentive  which  I  have  yet  received, 
if,  indeed,  any  incentive  were  needed  to  prevent  my 
flagging  in  so  sacred  a  cause.  But  I  will  venture  to- 
hope  that  this  reception  is  given  to  me  because  of  what 
I  have  done,  or  rather  tried  to  do,  in  the  past,  and  not 
in  the  expectation  that  I  can  make  to  you  any  great 
speech  on  the  present  occasion.  I  cannot  do  it,  because 
already  in  America,  my  time  has  been  too  much  occu- 
pied, and  my  physical  power  strained  to  the  utmost  by 
the  repeated  necessity  for  addressing  large  audiences. 

On  this  ground  to-day,  also,  my  remarks  will  be 
general,  and  above  all,  they  will  be  free  from  any 
admixture  of  oratory,  rhetoric,  or  eloquence — words  of 
which  the  two  first  have  always  had  for  me  an  obscure 


278  Temperance  Address. 

meaning,  and  of  which  the  third  expresses  a  magnificent 
gift  of  God,  to  the  possession  of  which  I  have  never 
had  the  smallest  claim,  or  put  forth  the  smallest  pre- 
tension. 

1.  Let  me  begin  with  telling  you  why  I  became  a 
total  abstainer.  Perhaps,  at  this  point,  some  of  my 
non-abstaining  friends  will  shudder  and  say  to  them- 
selves, now  we  are  going  to  have  a  specimen  of  that 
intemperate  language  which  a  bad  and  stale  epigram 
has  identified  with  temperance  reformers.  Now  we 
shall  have  all  kinds  of  interference  with  the  liberty  of 
the  subject  on  the  plea  of  ending  the  slavery  of  the 
abject.  Now  we  shall  hear  dubious  Scripture  argu- 
ments, and  uncharitably  Pharisaic  judgments.  Ladies 
and  gentlemen,  in  my  hands  I  think  that  you  ought  to 
feel  secure.  I  am  a  Vice-President  of  the  Church  of 
England  Temperance  Society,  and  that  great  society  is 
on  a  double  basis,  and  not  only  welcomes,  but  cordially 
invites,  the  co-operation  of  its  non-abstaining  section. 
I  am  ready  to  defend  the  principles  of  Total  Absti- 
nence when  they  are  attacked,  and  even  when  they  are 
depreciated  ;  but  I  am  not  ready,  and  never  have  been 
ready,  to  say  one  word  which  should  be  construed  into 
the  condemnation  of  my  brethren.  Let  every  man  be 
fully  persuaded  in  his  own  mind.  The  statement  of  my 
own  reasons  for  having  become,  ten  years  ago,  a  total 
abstainer,  is  not  meant  to  involve  the  shadow  of  the 
shade  of  a  judgment  upon  others. 

2.  My  reasons,  then,  for  taking  the  pledge  were 
partly  general  and  partly  special.  First,  I  became 
convinced  that  the  use  of  alcohol  in  any  form  was  not 
a  necessity.    I  saw  that  whole  nations  have  lived  and 


Temper a7ice  Address. 


flourished  without  it.  I  belieyed  that  the  whole  race 
of  man  had  existed  for  centuries  previous  to  its  discov- 
ery. I  was  struck  by  the  indisputable  fact  that  in 
England  30,000  inhabitants  of  our  prisons,  accustomed 
to  it  all  their  lives,  and  the  majority  of  them  brought 
into  prison  directly  or  indirectly  by  the  abuse  of  it, 
could  be,  and  were,  from  the  moment  of  their  imprison- 
ment, absolutely  deprived  of  it,  not  only  without  loss, 
but  with  entire  gain  to  their  personal  health.  Men 
enter  prison  sickly  and  blighted,  are  deprived  of  drink, 
and  leave  prison  strong  and  hale  ;  and  women  who, 
when  incarcerated,  are  hideous  to  look  upon,  after 
being  made  compulsoi'ily  sober  by  Act  of  Parliament, 
recover  the  bloom  of  health  and  almost  of  beauty. 
Next  I  derived  from  the  recorded  testimony  of  some 
of  our  most  eminent  physicians  that  the  use  of  alcohol 
is  a  subtle  and  manifold  source  of  disease  even  to  thou- 
sands who  use  it  in  quantities  conventionally  deemed 
moderate  ;  and  from  the  testimony  even  of  many  who 
discountenanced  total  abstinence  that  all  the  young,  and 
all  the  healthy,  and  all  who  eat  well  and  sleep  well  do 
not  require  it,  and  are  better  without  it.  Then  the 
carefully  drawn  statistics  of  many  insurance  societies 
convinced  me  that  total  abstinence,  so  far  from  short- 
ening life,  distinctly  and  indisputably  conduced  to  lon- 
gevity. Then  I  accumulated  proof  that  drink  is  so  far 
from  being  requisite  to  physical  strength  or  intellec- 
tual force,  that  many  of  the  greatest  athletes,  from  the 
days  of  Samson  onwards,  "  whose  drink  was  only  of  the 
crystal  brook,"  have  achieved,  without  alcohol,  mightier 
feats  than  have  ever  been  achieved  with  it ;  and  many 
of  the  world's  wisest,  even  if  they  have  not  said  with 


28o 


Temperance  Address. 


Pindar,  have  yet  drawn  a  better  inspiration  from  other 
sources  than  can  be  drawn  chemically  from  the  fumes 
of  wine.  Seeing  all  which,  and  much  more — seeing, 
too,  in  the  Holy  Scripture  God's  own  approval  of  His 
Nazarites,  who,  as  the  Prophet  Jeremiah  tells  us,  were 
"  purer  than  snow,  they  were  whiter  than  milk,  they 
were  more  ruddy  in  body  than  rubies,  their  polishing 
was  of  sapphires."  I  saw,  or  thought  I  saw,  grounds 
sufficient  and  superfluously  sufficient  to  make  me  an 
abstainer.  And  besides  all  this  I  knew  that  the  life 
of  man  always  gains  by  the  abolition  of  needless  ex- 
penses and  artificial  wants.  Your  own  wise  Ben- 
jamin Franklin  said  a  hundred  years  ago,  "  Temper- 
ance puts  wood  on  the  fire,  meat  in  the  barrel,  flour 
in  the  tub,  money  in  the  purse,  credit  in  the  country, 
clothes  on  the  bairns,  intelligence  in  the  brain,  and 
spirit  in  the  constitution. " 

Some  of  us  then,  perhaps,  became  abstainers  on  some 
such  grounds  as  these.  We  believed  by  evidence,  and 
we  have  found  by  experience,  that  our  small  self-denial, 
if  self-denial  it  could  even  be  called,  would  conduce  to 
health,  to  clearness  of  mind,  to  strength  of  body,  to 
length  of  days  and  simplicity  of  life.  Further  than 
this,  we  saw  that  life  is  full  of  temptations,  aud  that 
there  was  one  fatal  temptation,  at  any  rate,  from  which 
we  should  be  absolutely  and  under  all  circumstances 
exempt. 

3.  And  yet  these,  I  will  venture  to  say,  were  not  the 
reasons  which  prevailed  with  most  of  us.  "We  looked 
into  the  field  of  history,  and  from  the  days  of  that  hor- 
rible scene  in  the  tent  of  the  Patriarch  down  to  the 
records  of  yesterday,  we  saw  that  from  the  flood  down- 


Temperance  Address.  281 


ward  strong  drink  had  been  to  the  masses  of  mankind 
a  curse  intolerable  in  its  incidence  and  interminable  in 
its  malignity.  Even  the  most  ancient  writers,  profane 
as  well  as  sacred,  have,  like  Lucretius,  described  with 
horror  and  indignation  the  agonies  and  the  crimes  caused 
by  drunkenness ;  and  even  the  most  ancient  nations, 
like  the  Spartans,  have  endeavored  to  repudiate  its 
seductions.  It  is  sometimes  hinted  that  total  abstainers 
are  plebeian  and  ignorant  persons ;  but  plebeian  and 
ignorant  as  we  may  be,  we  can  refer  in  support  of  our 
views  to  books  the  most  refined,  to  authors  the  most 
fastidiously  delicate,  to  statesmen  the  least  wedded  to 
our  favorite  convictions.  Bead  Mr.  Trevelyan's  chapter 
on  "The  Age  of  Gout,"  in  his  life  of  Charles  James 
Fox  ;  read  Sir  Henry  Havelock's  contrast  of  the  siege  of 
Ghuzree  by  an  army  without  drink,  and  of  the  siege 
of  Luckuow  by  an  army  with  drink  ;  read  Sir  John 
Kaye's  thrilling  history  of  the  Indian  mutiny,  and  see 
how  the  drunkenness  of  the  troops  on  the  day  after  our 
first  lodgment  in  Delhi  was  within  an  ace  of  causing  to 
us  the  total  loss  of  our  Indian  Empire  ;  read  what  Mr. 
Kinglake  says  in  his  "  History  of  the  Crimean  War," 
of  British  soldiers,  gentle  as  women  and  brave  as  lions, 
until,  and  only  until,  the  drink  came  to  demoralize  and 
degrade  them  ;  read  the  testimony  of  many  eminent 
generals  that  a  sober  army  is  an  army  almost  without 
crime  ;  read  Mr.  Lecky's  remarkable  chapter  in  his 
"  History  of  European  Morals,"  of  the  effects  caused  by 
the  introduction  of  gin  among  the  lower  classes  in  the 
year  1724,  a  year  which,  on  that  account,  he  brands  as 
unapproachable  in  prolific  calamity  ;  read  the  testimony 
of  Bishop  Benson,  the  friend  and  patron  of  Whitefield, 


282  Temperance  Address. 


that  gin  was  making  the  English  people  what  they 
never  had  been  before — cruel  and  inhuman — and  that 
these  "cursed  spirituous  liquors,"  as  he  calls  them,  had 
changed  the  very  nature  of  the  people ;  read  the  pas- 
sionate denunciation  of  the  Gin  Act  by  the  most  polished 
gentleman  of  his  day,  the  famous  Lord  Chesterfield,  as 
an  act  "calculated  for  the  propagation  of  diseases,  the 
suppression  of  industry,  and  the  destruction  of  man- 
kind." Shall  I  go  farther  back  still,  and  tell  you  how, 
350  years  ago,  Shakespeare  wrote  "Oh,  thou  invisible 
spirit  of  wine,  if  there  is  no  other  name  thou  art  known 
by,  let  us  call  thee  devil  ;  "  how,  250  years  ago.  Bishop 
Hale  said  that  "  it  needed  a  deluge  of  fire  to  purge 
England  from  her  drunkenness  ;  "  how,  200  years  ago, 
the  great  Judge,  Sir  Matthew  Hale,  declared  that 
"  four  crimes  out  of  five  were  the  issue  of  excessive 
drinking  in  taverns  and  ale-houses."  Shall  I  come 
down  to  the  last  generation,  and  quote  to  you  the  testi- 
mony of  such  men  as  Charles  Lamb,  as  Hartley  Cole- 
ridge, and  Robert  Bums ;  or  shall  I  come  down  to  the 
present  day,  and  quote  to  you  (as  I  could  do)  words — 
words  which,  if  used  by  us,  would  have  been  denounced 
as  among  the  worst  instances  of  the  intemperate  lan- 
guage of  temperance  reformers — of  men  of  letters  like 
John  Morley,  and  John  Ruskin,  and  Thomas  Carlyle, 
and  of  the  Archbishop  of  York,  and  of  the  Bishop  of 
London,  and  of  the  Earl  of  Shaftesbury,  and  of  Lord 
Coleridge,  and  of  nearly  every  judge  who  sits  on  the 
bench  of  British  Themis,  and  who  knows,  by  daily  and 
dreadful  experience,  that  drink  is  totidem  Uteris  the 
very  synonym  of  crime.  Gentlemen,  it  is  all  nonsense 
for  the  defenders  of  drink  to  try  upon  us  either  the  con- 


Temperance  Address.  283 

Bpiracy  of  silence  or  the  inquiry  of  contempt.  As  to 
the  first,  we  will  make  our  own  voices  come  back  to  us 
in  millions  of  echoes ;  as  to  the  second,  we  know  that 
contempt  is  only  powerful  against  that  which  is  con- 
temptible. 

4.  Or  if  we  needed  proof  of  our  position — proof  that 
we  abstainers  are  not  the  mere  ignorant  fanatics  which 
we  are  described  to  be — let  us  pass  into  an  atmosphere 
which  is,  I  fear,  singularly  unsusceptible  to  the  blind 
passion  for  social  reform — the  atmosphere  of  the  English 
House  of  Commons.  It  is  rarely  that  I  have  seen  a 
thrill  of  manifest  emotion  pass  through  that  assem- 
blage ;  but  I  saw  and  I  felt  the  thrill,  I  saw  it  pass  as  a 
breeze  passes  over  the  fields  of  summer  corn,  when,  four 
years  ago  Mr.  Gladstone,  standing  at  the  table  as  Prime 
Minister,  said  that  drink  had  produced  evils  more 
deadly,  because  more  continuous,  than  those  caused  to 
mankind  by  the  great  historic  scourges  of  war,  famine, 
and  pestilence  combined.  The  sentiment  was  not 
original.  It  had  first  been  said  by  a  brewer  of  genius, 
a  Member  of  Parliament,  Mr.  Charles  Buxton,  who  had 
had  amplest  opportunities  of  knowing  the  truth  of 
what  he  said.  But  Mr.  Gladstone  quoted  it ;  he  ac- 
cepted it ;  he  indorsed  it  with  all  the  weight  of  his 
high  position,  of  his  immense  experience,  of  his  vast 
knowledge  of  mankind.  He  indorsed  it ;  he  abides  by 
it ;  he  has  never  withdrawn  it.  He  is  not  a  total  ab- 
stainer. There  are  some  temperance  reformers  who  do 
not  think  that  his  liquor-legislation  has  been  suc- 
cessful ;  there  are  many  who  believe  that  he  might  have 
yielded  more  to  us,  might  have  done  more  for  us,  than 
he  has  done.    But  at  least  he  has  done  our  cause  the 


284  Temperance  Address. 


service  of  this  tremendous  sentence,  so  fatally  true,  so 
awfully  descriptive,  so  overwhelming  a  justification  of 
all  we  have  done  and  said — nay,  so  smiting  a  reproof  to 
us  tliat,  after  all,  we  have  done  and  said  so  little.  For, 
if  words  have  any  meaning  at  all,  only  think  what  those 
words  mean.  War — you  know  by  no  remote  experience 
what  war  is — its  agonies,  its  horrors,  its  crimes  ; — its 
widowed  homes,  its  orphaned  children,  its  ghastly  wounds 
— youths  with  their  lives  prematurely  cut  ofi — brave  men 
with  the  life-blood  slowly  ebbing  from  their  veins  in  the 
chill  moonlight,  on  the  crimson  turf.  Famine,  we  know 
that  where  that  meagre  spectre  stalks  in  cities,  it  turns 
men  into  wild  beasts,  and  makes  the  mother's  eye  cruel 
to  her  infant  at  the  breast.  Pestilence  we  have  had  of 
late  ;  it  turns  the  inhabitants  of  cities  into  poltroons  ; 
how  men  fly  from  it  in  thousands,  in  panic-stricken 
cowardice  ;  how  it  paralyzes  industry  ;  how  it  snatches 
the  last  consolation  from  the  living,  and  a  hallowed 
grave  from  the  dead ;  and  is  there  to  be  vice,  a  pre- 
ventable vice,  in  the  midst  of  us  which  causes  evils 
deadlier,  because  more  continuous,  than  the  three  great 
historic  scourges.  War,  Famine,  and  Pestilence  com- 
bined ?  And  are  we  to  be  cold,  indifferent,  so  neutral, 
so  selfishly  acquiescent,  making  no  serious,  no  united 
effort  to  put  an  end  to  this  wide-wasting  conflagra- 
tion— to  tins  immeasurable  catastrophe  ?  War,  if 
m  time  of  war  he  deserves  a  civic  crown  who  saves 
the  life  of  a  single  citizen  ;  famine,  if  he  be  bene- 
factor of  the  race  who  makes  two  corn-ears  grow  where 
but  one  grew  before  ;  pestilence,  if  one  of  the  noblest 
acts  of  history  is  that  of  him  who  stood  between  the 
living  and  the  dead,  and  the  plague  was  stayed; — if  in 


Temperance  Address.  285 


time  of  war,  blessed  are  the  peace-makers  ;  if  in  days  of 
famine  it  be  noble  to  feed  the  hungry  ;  if  in  visitation 
of  plague  it  is  divine  to  heal  the  sick ;  then  surely,  in 
face  of  an  evil  more  deadly  in  its  effects,  because  more 
continuous,  than  war,  famine  and  pestilence  combined, 
we  must  be  at  the  last  gasp  of  national  honor,  in  the 
last  paralysis  of  national  selfishness,  if  there  be  not 
among  us  enough  salt  of  morality,  enough  fire  of  cour- 
age, enough  passion  of  enthusiasm,  to  grapple  with  this 
intolerable  curse. 

5.  But,  gentlemen,  I  can  tell  you  in  four  letters  of  one 
motive  for  abstinence,  which  in  my  own  mind  was  as 
Aaron's  serpent  rod  and  prevailed  over  all  the  rest.  It 
was  pity,  sheer  human  pity.  I  will  not  stop  to  tell  you 
the  horrible  results  of  drunkenness  which,  in  my  own 
parish,  under  the  very  shadows  of  the  great  Abbey,  I 
have  seen  with  my  own  eyes  and  heard  with  my  own 
ears.   If  I  did  I  could  indeed  say  to  you 

"  Come,  sit  you  down, 
And  I  will  wring  your  heart ;  for  so  I  shall. 
If  it  be  made  of  penetrable  stuff 
If  damned  custom  have  not  brazed  it  so 
That  it  is  proof  and  bulwark  against  sense." 

But  I  may  presume  that  I  am  speaking  to  those  who 
are  familiar  with  the  common  facts — so  common  yet  so 
ghastly — which  in  England,  at  any  rate,  are  enough  to 
make  us  blush  with  shame  and  bum  with  indignation. 
I  believed,  and  still  believe,  or  rather  I  now  not  only 
believe  but  know,  that  by  becoming  an  abstainer,  by 
taking  part  in  Temperance  Reform,  I  could  help  others; 
and  if  others  could  have  known  and  seen  all  that  I  have 
seen,  I  believed  that  in  their  case,  too, 


286 


Temperance  Address. 


"Pity  like  a  naked,  new-born  babe 
Striding  the  blast,  and  heaven's  cherubim  horsed 
Upon  the  sightless  couriers  of  the  air 
Would  blow  these  horrid  deeds  in  every  eye, 
That  tears  could  drown  the  wind." 

I  would  then  appeal  to  all  for  pity  pity  for  the  yast 
multitudes  who  become  the  helpless  victims  of  a  dead 
chemical  product,  potent  to  destroy  the  souls  for  which 
Christ  died  ;  pity  for  the  ravages  wrought  by  this  bitter 
source  of  human  woe ;  pity  for  the  hundreds  and  thou- 
sands of  men,  who,  under  this  hideous  fascination, 
degrade  their  lives  into  the  misery  and  pollution  of  a 
long-continued  death  ;  pity  for  the  youths  who  thus 
"pour  poison  into  the  roses  of  their  youth,"  so  that  its 
root  is  as  rottenness  ;  pity  for  the  hearts  of  mothers  rent 
by  anguish  for  these  their  ruined  prodigals  ;  pity  for  the 
wives  and  husbands  on  whose  hearth  burn  the  fires  of 
hell ;  pity  for  the  unmotherly  mothers  and  unwomanly 
women  who  nigh  turn  motherhood  to  shame,  womanli- 
ness to  loathing  ;  pity  for  those  lurid  tragedies  where 
the  vitriol  maddens  ;  or  is  there  no  voice  strong  enough 
to  plead  like  angels  trumpet-tongued  against  the  deep 
damnation  of  their  bodies ;  pity  for  the  little  children 
who,  in  the  awful  language  of  South  are,  because  of 
drink,  not  so  much  born  into  the  world  as  damned  into 
the  world,  born  to  lives  of  disease  and  degradation,  or 
in  these  Christian  lands  yearly  pass  through  the  fire  to 
this  idol  in  far  vaster  multitudes  than  were  ever  sacri- 
ficed of  old  in  the  Valley  of  Hinnom  to  Moloch  the  abom- 
ination of  the  children  of  Ammon  ;  pity  for  England, 
which  now,  for  fully  two  centuries,  has  been  writhing 
in  these  dragon-folds  of  licensed  temptations ;  pitj  for 


Temperance  Address. 


287 


the  whole  race  of  mankind,  which  sends  up  a  cry  from 
every  polluted  continent,  and  which  yet  cherishes — aye, 
and  fondly — in  its  bosom  this  venomous  and  deadly  asp. 
Alone  of  human  woes,  dear  heaven,  it  is  a  curse  of 
which  the  entail  might  be  at  once  cut  off ;  and  yet 
mankind,  partly  blinded  by  conceit,  partly  seduced  by 
pleasure,  and  partly  rendered  callous  by  greed,  still  suf- 
fers drink  for  year  after  year,  in  every  continent,  almost 
in  every  city,  to  blast  innumerable  careers  and  to  blight 
innumerable  homes — a  folly,  which  almost  drives  us 
to  say  with  the  despairing  moralist  that  it  seems  as  if 
humanity  were  still  half  serpent  and  yet  half  extracted 
from  the  clay,  a  lacertian  brood  of  bitterness,  whose  trail 
is  on  the  leaf  a  guilty  slime  and  in  the  land  a  useless 
furrow. 

6.  Gentlemen,  this  cause  of  Temperance  Eeform, 
which,  in  my  own  mind,  and  I  believe  in  the  minds  of 
millions,  is  mainly  the  child  of  pity,  appeals  to  us  as 
Humanitarians  ;  it  appeals  to  us  as  Philanthropists  ;  it 
appeals  to  us  with  million-fold  force  as  Christians  ;  but 
if  I  harrowed  the  ground  quite  indefinitely,  might  I  not 
assume  that  it  should  appeal  to  us  with  gigantic  force 
merely  as  patriots.  "  National  crime,"  said  Oliver 
Cromwell,  "is  a  thing  that  God  will  reckon  for;  and  I 
wish  it  may  not  lie  on  the  nation  a  day  longer  than  you 
have  an  opportunity  to  find  a  remedy."  The  drink  sys- 
tem is  a  national  crime.  "A  prosperous  iniquity,"  said 
Jeremy  Taylor,  "  is  the  most  unprofitable  condition  in 
the  world."  I  so  hold  the  drink  system  is  a  prosperous 
iniquity.  "I  do  not  believe,"  said  Burke,  "that  any 
good  constitution  of  government  or  freedom  can  find  it 
necessary  to  drive  any  part  of  their  people  to  a  perma- 


288  Temperance  Address. 


nent  slavery."  The  drink  system  overcomes  tens  of 
thousands.  "  If  I  thought,"  said  your  own  great  ora- 
tor, Daniel  Webster,  "  that  there  was  a  stain  upon 
the  remotest  hem  of  the  garment  of  my  country,  I 
■would  devote  my  utmost  labors  to  wipe  it  off."  This  is 
the  duty  of  every  patriot.  This  is  what,  in  my  small 
measure,  according  to  my  feeble  capacity,  I  have  striven 
to  do.  For,  whatever  may  be  the  case  in  America,  it  is 
certainly  the  case  in  England  that  drunkenness,  and  the 
licensed,  the  profitable,  the  wealth-producing  monopoly 
which  causes  drunkenness,  is  a  stain  not  only  upon 
the  hem  but  dyeing  all  the  white  robes  of  England,  a 
stain  of  the  deepest  dye — a  stain  deep  and  crimson 
enough  to  incarnadine  the  multitudinous  lives  over 
which  she  rules. 

7.  Yes,  and  I  will  confess  that  I  am  weary  and  dis- 
heartened by  the  slowness  of  our  progress.  After  so 
many  years  of  struggle,  we  are  misunderstood,  we  are 
misrepresented,  we  are  incessantly  made  the  object  of 
taunts  and  sneers.  For  this  we  care  nothing,  or  less  than 
nothing.  They  say — what  say  they  ? — let  them  say. 
Let  echo  repeat,  if  it  will,  the  sounds  that  are  emptiest. 
Let  men  fling  more  stones  at  us  than  other  men  have 
roses  showered  on  them.  We  have  counted  the  cost. 
We  have  learnt  the  lesson  which  some  of  your  own  great 
speakers  have  helped  to  teach  us  that  God  is  the  only 
final  public  opinion  ;  that  one  with  God  is  always  in  a 
majority.  But  what  we  do  grieve  at  is,  if  not  the  com- 
parative failure  of  our  efforts,  yet  the  painful  slowness 
of  our  success.  We  have  seized  the  axe,  we  have  thrown 
it  to  its  backmost  poise.  We  have  struck  sturdy  strokes, 
but  as  yet  we  have  hardly  wounded  the  tough  rind  of 


Temperance  Address.  289 


this  upas  tree.  We  have  not  split  the  gnarled  ohtusity 
of  the  prejudices  which  are  opposed  tons.  We  have  not 
cleft  the  hoary  head  of  inveterate  abuses.  We  have 
wrought  no  deliverance  on  the  earth,  and  are  not  better 
than  our  fathers.    And  yet 

"  We  bate  no  jot 
Of  heart  or  hope,  but  still  bear  on,  and  steer 
Up-hill  ward." 

Cobbett  wrote  and  spoke  but  for  a  few  years,  and  then 
he  was  helped  to  carry  the  Reform  Bill.  Cobden  and 
Bright  harangued  for  ten  years,  and  then,  in  the  teeth 
of  antagonistic  prejudice  and  ignorant  selfishness  they 
procured  the  abolition  of  the  corn-laws.  It  is  fully  a 
hundred  years  since  temperance  efforts  began  in  Eng- 
land. It  is  more  than  fifty  years  since  Joseph  Livesey 
and  the  seven  men  of  Trenton,  formed  the  first  society 
of  Total  Abstainers,  and  yet,  in  spite  of  an  abstract  reso- 
lution in  favor  of  local  option,  thrice  passed  by  increas- 
ing majorities  in  the  House  of  Commons,  we  have  scarce- 
ly advanced  one  step  nearer  to  effective  legislation.  So 
strong  is  the  might  of  callous  selfishness,  of  interested 
wealth  !  Yet  we  do  not  and  we  will  not  despair.  I 
have  some  hopes  in  the  recent  enormous  extension  of 
the  franchise.  I  shall  see  cause  to  despair,  indeed,  if 
the  more  the  power  is  given  into  the  hands  of  the 
people,  the  less  it  does  not  become  in  the  tyrannous 
hands  of  gin  distillers  and  publicans.  "Give  me,"  said 
Wendell  Phillips,  "  anything  that  walks  erect  and  can 
read,  and  he  shall  count  one  in  the  millions  of  the 
Lord's  sacramental  host,  which  is  yet  to  come  up  and 
trample  all  oppression  into  the  dust."  I  know  how 
19 


290  Temperance  Address. 


dumb,  how  patient  a  people  may  be  when  it  has  suc- 
cumbed for  long  years  to  the  temptations  so  sedulously 
prepared  for  it,  when  the  minimum  of  resistance  is 
enringed  as  with  a  cordon  of  fire  by  the  maximum  of 
seductive  ruin,  when  it  is  baffled  by  sophistries,  and 
bewildered  by  epigrams,  and  deafened  by  the  cries  for 
liberty  which  are  often  raised  most  loudly  by  oppres- 
sors. But  I  know,  also,  that  if  we  still  try  to  educate 
in  the  people  the  moral  sense,  if  we  awaken  in  drink- 
besotted  multitudes  the  dormant  conscience,  if  we 
kindle  in  slain  souls  the  passion  for  deliverance,  sooner 
or  later  the  people  will  speak  in  a  voice  of  thunder  ;  in 
a  voice  whose  mandates  can  no  longer  be  resisted  ;  in  a 
voice  whose  roar  shall  be  as  the  sound  of  the  advancing 
chariot  wheels  of  Eetribution ;  in  a  voice  which  shall 
thunder  through  senates  and  palaces,  and  be  heard 
at  the  Almighty  throne.  When  the  snow  begins  to 
vanish  from  the  crater  of  the  volcano,  the  day  may 
not  be  distant  when  bellowing  eruptions  shall  shatter 
its  rocky  fastnesses,  the  burning  lava  shall  flood  its 
slopes. 

8.  It  is  thus  that  every  great  moral,  social,  and  re- 
ligious reform  has  been  achieved.  Many  spring  from 
the  few,  mostly  from  the  individual,  one  man  becomes 
impressed  with  a  deep  conviction.  It  haunts — it  mas- 
ters him.  It  becomes  the  ruling  purpose  and  passion 
of  his  life.  While  he  is  musing  the  fire  burns,  and 
at  last  he  speaks  with  his  tongue.  And  no  sooner  has 
he  spoken,  be  it  even  with  a  tongue  stammering  like 
that  of  Moses,  than  he  finds  that  he  has  not  been  soli- 
tary in  his  convictions.  Others  have  already  thought 
as  he  has  done.    They  rally  round  him  ;  they  catch 


Temperance  Address.  291 


fire  with  a  common  enthusiasm  ;  they  flash  into  other 
hearts  the  same  nobleness,  the  same  readiness  to  spend, 
and  to  be  spent,  in  a  good  cause. 

Thi3  was  the  history  of  the  abolition  of  gladiatorial 
games.  This  was  the  history  of  the  Reformation.  This 
was  the  history  of  the  most  lovely  and  righteous  acts 
in  the  long  annals  of  England — first  the  abolition  of  the 
slave-trade,  then  the  emancipation  of  the  slave. 

Whenever  I  walk  through  the  aisles  of  Westminster 
I  see  the  record  of  the  struggle  there  in  the  grave  of 
Wilberforce,  the  statue  of  Sir  F.  Buxton,  the  tombs  of 
Granville,  Sharpe,  and  Zachary  Macaulay,  who  rescued 
their  native  country  from  the  guilt  of  using  the  arm  of 
freedom  to  rivet  the  fetters  of  the  slave.  Such  memo- 
rials are  the  historic  witnesses  to  great  truths.  They 
remind  us  of  the  toil  and  the  peril  required  for  moral 
reformation  ;  the  slow  awakenment  of  the  conscience 
of  mankind  ;  the  kindling  of  enthusiasm,  first  of  all, 
in  the  minds  of  the  few,  and  then  its  reflection  like 
some  beacon-light  flashed  from  mountain  peak  to  moun- 
tain peak  by  the  minds  of  the  many. 

Well,  gentlemen,  in  this  great  crusade  to  deliver 
mankind — at  any  rate  to  deliver,  to  the  utmost  of  our 
power,  the  English-speaking  race,  to  whom  are  mani- 
festly intrusted  the  future  destinies  of  the  world — from 
this  curse  of  intoxication,  next  to  God,  we  must  trust 
to  two  things — one  the  life-long  purpose  of  some  intense 
and  absorbing  enthusiasm,  burning  like  the  altar  flame 
in  the  heart  of  some  single  man,  or  of  some  few  men ; 
and  next,  the  rousing  of  some  great  people  shaking 
those  invincible  locks — the  laws  of  the  moral  convic- 
tions— which  lie  like  the  sunny  locks  of  Samson,  waving 


292  Temperance  Address. 


over  its  illustrious  shoulders.  Men — single  men — must 
rise  first  like  Clarkson,  or  Lloyd  Garrison  ;  groups  of 
men,  like  the  early  Abolitionists,  who  shall  not  be  afraid 
to  lift  their  strong  arms  to  bring  heaven  a  little  nearer 
to  this  earth.  And  if  we  cannot  be  of  these  glorious 
few,  we  may  help  them  in  the  moral  world  by  some- 
thing analogous  to  the  physical  law,  which  is  known 
as  the  superimposition  of  small  impacts.  Let  the  great 
beam  of  iron  hang  in  the  air,  dull,  and  heavy,  and  mo- 
tionless ;  strike  it  again  and  again  with  but  a  little 
pellet  of  pith  or  cork.  At  first  your  endeavor  will  look 
utterly  ridiculous.  Every  one  will  laugh  at  you.  But, 
however,  it  will  not  be  long  before  the  great  mass  begins 
to  thrill,  then  to  shiver,  then  to  tremble,  then  to  move, 
then  to  sway  and  oscillate,  lastly  to  swing  with  vast,  reg- 
ular, and  rhythmic  swing.  The  thousands  of  tiny  im- 
pacts have  had  an  aggregate  or  collective  force,  stronger 
than  would  have  been  produced  by  a  giant's  arm.  In 
this  way,  at  least,  we  all  can  give  our  help.  In  this 
way  each  one  of  us  may  contribute  his  infinitesimal 
quota  to  the  amelioration  of  the  world. 

9.  But  you  in  America  must  help  us  in  England 
with  all  your  might.  You  in  this  matter  must  lead  the 
way.  You  are  doing  it.  I  do  not  say  it  to  flatter  you. 
I  do  not  desire  to  flatter  you.  I  say  it  in  the  dark.  In 
all  matters  of  Temperance  Legislation,  in  the  education 
and  enlightenment  of  the  moral  sense  on  the  great 
question,  you  are  already  far  ahead  of  us.  In  this 
field,  more  than  any  other,  you  can  repay  the  debt  of 
gratitude  you  owe  to  us.  You  owe  to  us  the  debt  of 
your  liberty  of  independence,  for  it  was  Hampden 
and  Cromwell,  and  young  Vane  who  sowed  the  seed 


Temperance  Address.  293 


which  resulted  fo"  you  also,  after  your  civil  war,  in 
the  glorious  decision  that  there  should  be  slaves  no 
longer  in  the  country  of  the  free.  "  Only  once  in  the 
broad  sweep  of  human  history,"  said  Mr.  Wendell 
Phillips,  "  only  once  was  any  nation  lifted  so  high  that 
she  could  stretch  her  imperial  hand  across  the  Atlantic, 
and  lift  by  one  peaceful  word  a  million  of  slaves  into 
liberty.  God  granted  that  glory  only  to  your  mother 
land."  Yes,  but  you  can  emulate  that  glory  ;  you  can 
repay  that  debt  of  moral  gratitude.  We  helped  you  to 
bear  the  sentiment  and  the  convictions  which  at  last 
obliterated  for  ever  from  your  history  the  stains  and 
shame  of  slavery.  Do  you  help  us  to  wipe  away  from 
our  annals  the  plague  spots  of  tolerated  vice.  You  are 
about  to  erect  in  the  entrance  of  the  harbor  of  this 
mighty  city  your  statue  of  Liberty,  the  enlightener  of 
the  world.  You  have  already  erected  the  staff  pedestal; 
soon  may  the  furled  statue  rear  in  the  august  surges  her 
boundless  brow.  See  that  her  shield  is  stainless,  see 
that  there  be  no  rust  upon  it, — no  splashes  upon  it  in 
the  blood  of  souls,  which  shall  prevent  it  from  flashing 
back  the  sun  of  God,  the  sun  of  the  righteousness  of 
heaven.  Behind  the  vast  amplitude  of  that  immortal 
shield  may  the  oppressed  of  all  lands  find  an  inviolable 
refuge,  but  never  let  the  tyrant  or  the  oppressor  hide 
under  its  silver  shadow  to  shoot  them  with  deadly  arrows 
in  Freedom's  prostituted  name.  Then  shall  your  Liberty 
wear  forever  the  crown  of  stars  upon  her  head,  and  hold 
fast  the  olive  branch  in  her  hand,  and  trample  the  chains 
of  every  slave  beneath  her  feet.  So  shall  America 
strengthen  England  as  England  has  inspired  America. 
May  both  nations  alike  be  animated  by  the  strong  con- 


294  Temperance  Address. 

viction  of  devoted  faithfulness.  May  we  alike  feel  that 
"in  God's  war  slackness  is  infamy,"  I  would  say  to 
you,  to  each  of  you,  and  to  the  whole  of  this  great  na- 
tion, in  the  dying  words  of  the  holy  and  eloquent 
Ravignan,  "Fight,  fight,  fight  the  battles  of  the 
Lord." 


LECTURE  I. 


I  WISH  tins  evening  to  speak  to  you  about  the  life 
and  teachings  of  one  of  the  greatest,  perhaps  I  should 
sav  the  greatest,  religious  poet  who  ever  lived.  Of 
the  multitudes  of  poets  who  have  in  all  ages  been  in- 
spired to  teach  us  the  noble  in  conduct  and  the  pure  in 
thought,  few  only  have  deserved  the  high  Latin  title 
of  Vates,  a  name  which  means  not  a  poet  only,  but 
also  a  bard  and  a  seer.  And  of  these  there  are  still 
fewer  who  impress  us  with  the  sense  of  something  pe- 
culiarly sublime  in  their  personalty.  Indeed,  I  hardly 
know  of  more  than  three  whom  I  should  name  as  exer- 
cising this  magnetic  effect  on  the  imagination.  Those 
three  are  ^schylus,  Dante,  and  Milton  ; — and  of  these 
three,  neither  of  the  others  in  so  supreme  a  degree  as 
Dante. 

Wordsworth,  that  pure  and  lofty  poet  whose  soul 
was  akin  to  Milton's  own,  has  expressed  this  aspect  of 
Milton's  character. 

"  Thy  soul  was  like  a  star,  and  dwelt  apart  ; 
Thou  hadst  a  voice  whose  sound  was  like  the  sea, 


296 


Dante. 


Pure  as  the  naked  heavens,  majestic,  free  ; 
So  didst  thou  travel  on  life's  common  way 
In  cheerful  godliness  ;  and  3'ot  thy  heart 
The  lowliest  duties  on  herself  did  lay." 

And  again,  in  his  Prelude,  he  calls  him, 

"  Soul  awful,  if  this  world  has  ever  held 
An  awful  soul." 

Now  with  all  this  eulogy,  lofty  as  it  is,  I  fully 
agree ;  and  if  there  be  any  other  poet  to  whom  it  be- 
longs, in  even  fuller  measure,  it  is  Dante  Alighieri. 
His  very  names  sound  like  a  prophetic  intimation  of 
his  greatness.  Dante  is  said  to  be  an  abbreviation  of 
"  Durante  " — the  lasting,  the  permanent ;  Alighieri, 
one  (that  is)  of  the  "  wing-bearers,"  of  whom  his  coat 
of  arms — an  eagle's  wing  in  an  azure  field — is  the  most 
fitting  symbol. 

Gray,  in  his  ode  on  the  "  Progress  of  Poesy,"  spoke 
of  Milton  as 

"  he  who  rode  sublime 
Upon  the  seraph-wings  of  ecstacy, 
The  secrets  of  the  abyss  to  spy. 
He  passed  the  flaming  bounds  of  time  and  space. 
The  living  throne,  the  sapphire  blaze, 
Where  angels  tremble  while  they  gaze  ; 
He  saw,  but  blasted  with  excess  of  light, 
Closed  his  eyes  in  endless  nij^ht." 

The  last  lines  are  but  a  fanciful  allusion  to  Milton's 
blindness;  but  of  Dante  it  may  be  said  that  he  saw  with 
eagle's  eye,  undazzled.  No  poet's  soul  ever  showed  the 
same  heroic  dauntlessness.  He  trod,  with  unseared 
feet,  the  very  depths  of  Hell,  in  all  its  agony  and  ghast- 


Dante. 


297 


liness  ;  he  toiled  up  the  mountain  terraces  of  Purgatory; 
he  moved  as  unfalteringly  over  heaven's  azure  as  over 
the  burning  marble  ;  he  mingled  on  equal  terms  among 
its  living  rubies  and  topazes  ;  he  saw  the  whole  rose  of 
Paradise  unfolded  ;  he  gazed  on  the  mystic  triumph  of 
Christ,  and  on  the  Beatific  Light  of  the  Triune  God  ; 
and  in  every  scene,  lurid  or  celestial,  before  every  per- 
sonage, demonic  or  divine,  whether  he  be  speaking  to 
lost  souls,  or  giants,  or  coarse  fiends,  or  beatified 
spirits  of  the  redeemed,  or  apostles,  or  "thrones,  domi- 
nations, virtues,  princedoms,  powers,"  he  retains  before 
them  all  and  everywhere  the  royal  PriesthG^od,  the  im- 
mortal dignity  of  a  man — of  a  man  made  in  the  image 
of  God,  and  for  whom  Christ  died. 

It  is  because  such  a  poet  seems  to  me  peculiarly 
fitted  to  teach,  and  elevate  this  age,  and  to  make  it 
blush  for  its  favorite  vices,  that  I  have  ventured  to 
speak  of  him.  There  is  no  function  which  poets  can 
fulfil  comparable  to  their  high  posthumous  privilege  of 
permanently  enriching  the  blood  of  the  world,  and 
raising  humanity  to  higher  levels.  Nations  that  pos- 
sess such  poets  as  Dante  and  Milton  ought  never  to 
degenerate.  But  they  belong  not  to  nations  only, 
but  to  all  the  world.  If  any  young  men  should 
chance  to  be  among  my  audience  to-night,  I  would 
earnestly  invite  them  to  hold  high  and  perpetual 
companionship  with  such  souls  as  these.  And  if 
there  should  be  any  here  who  have  hitherto  found 
their  chief  delight  in  meaner  things,  which  dwarf  the 
intellectual  faculties  and  blunt  the  moral  sense,  I  would 
fain  hope  that,  here  and  there,  one  of  them  may  be 
induced  to  turn  away  from  such  follies,  to  breathe  the 


298 


Dante. 


pure,  difficult,  eager  air  of  severe  and  holy  poems  like 
the  "  Divina  Coramedia,"  and  the  "Paradise  Lost," 

For,  indeed,  the  "Divine  Comedy"  is,  as  has  been 
said,  "one  of  the  landmarks  of  history.  More  than  a 
magnificent  poem,  more  than  the  beginning  of  a  lan- 
guage, and  the  opening  of  a  national  literature,  more 
than  the  inspirer  of  art,  and  the  glory  of  a  great  people, 
it  is  one  of  those  rare  and  solemn  monuments  of  the 
mind's  power  which  measure  and  test  what  it  can  reach 
to  ;  which  rise  up,  ineffaceably  and  forever,  as  time 
goes  on,  marking  out  its  advance  by  grander  divisions 
than  its  centuries,  and  adopted  as  epochs  by  the  con- 
sent of  all  who  come  after.  They  who  know  it  best 
would  wish  others  also  to  know  the  power  of  that  won- 
derful poem  ;  its  austere  yet  subduing  beauty ;  what 
force  there  is  in  its  free  and  earnest  and  solemn 
verse  to  strengthen,  to  tranquillize,  to  console.  Its 
seriousness  has  put  to  shame  their  trifling  ;  its  mag- 
nanimity their  faint-hearted ness  ;  its  living  energy  their 
indolence  ;  its  stern  and  sad  grandeur  has  rebuked  low 
thoughts  ;  its  thrilling  tenderness  has  overcome  sullen- 
ness,  and  assuaged  distress  ;  its  strong  faith  quelled 
despair  and  soothed  perplexity  ;  its  vast  grasp  imparted 
the  sense  of  harmony  to  the  view  of  clashing  truths. 
After  holding  converse  with  such  grandeur,  our  lives 
can  never  be  so  small  again."  * 

He  was  born  in  Florence  in  1265,  and  I  shall  not 
now  dwell  upon  his  biography.  Suffice  it  to  say  that 
the  outline  of  his  life  may  be  summed  up  under  the  four 
words.  Love,  Philosophy,  Politics,  Exile. 


*  Dean  Church. 


Dante. 


1.  First,  Love.  He  was  but  a  dreamy,  poetic  boy  of 
nine  years  old  when  be  first  saw  and  loved  Beatrice,  the 
daughter  of  Folco  Portinari.  The  story  of  his  love  is 
told  in  his  "Vita  Nuova."  Love  was  his  earliest  idol, 
and  God — whose  hand  is  so  visible  in  this  poet's  life — 
early  shattered  it.  Beatrice,  at  twenty,  married  another, 
and  at  twenty-five  she  died. 

"  Death,  the  great  monitor,  oft  comes  to  prove 
'Tis  dust  we  dote  on  when  'tis  man  we  love." 

And  yet  let  us  not  say  that  Dante's  love  came  to 
nothing.  It  came  to  something  far  more  divine  than 
could  have  been  the  disenchantment  of  any  mere  earthly 
satisfaction.  He  might  have  said,  with  the  modern  poet : 

"He  who  for  love  hath  undergone 

The  worst  that  can  befall, 
Is  happier,  thousand-fold,  than  one 

Who  never  loved  at  all. 
A  grace  within  his  soul  hath  reigned 

That  nothing  else  can  bring; — 
Thank  God  for  all  that  I  have  gained 

By  that  high  suffering." 

By  that  absolutely  pure,  noble,  ideal,  ethereal  love 
the  youth's  whole  soul  was  elevated.  The  sweet  child, 
the  lovely  maid,  the  pure  and  noble  woman,  gave  to 
Dante's  soul  those  wings  of  unselfish  devotion  by  which 
it  was  lifted  up  to  God. 

So,  then,  for  his  own  good,  and  for  the  riches  of  the 
world's  ennoblement,  was  Dante's  first  idol  broken — the 
idol  of  earthly  adoration;  broken,  or  let  us  rather  say, 
transfigured  into  something  heavenly.  Nor  was  it  other- 
wise with  his  second  idol,  Philosophy.    Of  this  we  can- 


300 


Dante. 


not  say  much,  because  Dante  has  only  alluded  to  it 
obscurely  and  in  enigma.  He  says  that  philosophy 
became  his  consolation,  and  he  studied  Eoethius  and 
Cicero.  But  it  is  clear  from  the  stern  reproaches 
addressed  to  him  by  Beatrice  at  the  end  of  the 
"Purgatorio,"  that  during  these  years  of  his  life  he  fell 
away.  His  philosophy  engrossed  him.  It  led  him  to 
ofEer  strange  fire  upon  the  altar  of  his  life.  He  forgot 
the  new  life  which  an  ideal  love  had  breathed  into  him, 
and  "an  intellectual  and  sensitive  delight  in  good  ran 
parallel  with  a  voluntary  and  actual  indulgence  in  evil." 
From  this  he  represents  himself  as  delivered  by  a  vision 
of  Beatrice,  now  in  glory,  and  now  to  him  the  emblem 
of  divine  knowledge.  But  we  can  see  this  only— that 
earthly  knowledge  was  not  suffered  to  absorb  the  soul 
which  could  only  be  satisfied  by  heaven,  and  that  the 
second  idol  also  was  broken. 

Then  began  the  third  phase  of  his  life  in  Politics. 
His  public  life  was  full  and  passionate.  He  loved  his 
native  city  with  an  intense  devotion.  He  has  crowned 
her  with  an  immortal  shame  and  an  immortal  glory. 
Florence  was  to  him  as  all  the  world.  Hell  and  Purga- 
tory and  Heaven  ring  with  the  name  of  Florence,  and 
are  filled  with  Florentines.  And  nobly,  and  with  stern 
justice,  did  Dante  serve  and  help  to  govern  her.  I  shall 
not  follow  him  into  the  obscure  and  miserable  imbroglio 
of  the  struggles  of  his  day — the  parties  of  Guelph  and 
Ghibelline,  the  family  feuds  of  Bianchi  and  Neri,  which 
only  derive  a  touch  of  interest  from  their  connection 
with  his  intense  and  supreme  personality.  Suffice  it  to 
say  that,  in  the  course  of  that  divine  education  whereby 
God  trains  us  all,  as  the  lover  had  become  a  student  and 


Dante. 


301 


a  soldier,  so  the  student  became  a  politician.  He  fought 
in  the  battle  of  Campaldino ;  he  took  part  in  no  less 
than  fourteen  embassies.  By  the  age  of  thirty-five  he 
had  risen  to  be  the  first  magistrate  of  Florence. 

The  struggle  and  passion  of  politics,  forcing  him 
into  collision  with  his  fellow-men  and  with  the  hard 
facts  of  life,  made  him  something  more  than  the  soft 
poetic  boy,  so  sensitive  and  delicate,  writing  sonnets, 
recording  visions,  painting  angels,  trembling  at  a  toucb; 
more  even  than  the  student  of  letters,  science,  and  phi- 
losophy. It  also  decided  the  destiny  of  his  remaining 
years.  Caught  up  in  the  whirlwinds  of  political  strife, 
he  hurried  back  from  an  embassy  at  Rome  to  hear  that 
his  house  had  been  pillaged  and  burnt  to  the  gi'ound,  and 
himself  infamously  charged  with  malversation  and  em- 
bezzlement. He  was  banished  from  Florence,  the  city  of 
his  birth,  the  city  of  his  manhood,  the  city  of  his  love, 
and  hurled  into  exile  under  sentence  of  being  burnt 
alive,  if  he  ever  set  foot  again  in  the  city  for  which,  for  a 
short  time,  he  had  ruled.  "Alas,"  he  says,  "I  have 
gone  about  like  a  mendicant,  showing,  against  my  will, 
the  wounds  Avith  which  fortune  has  smitten  me.  I 
have,  indeed,  been  a  vessel  without  sail  and  without 
rudder,  carried  to  divers  shores  by  the  dry  wind  that 
springs  out  of  poverty."  It  was  long  before  he  aban- 
doned the  hope  that  one  day  his  fellow-citizens,  repent- 
ing of  their  base  injustice,  might  recall  him  ;  and  that 
he  might  claim  the  poetic  wreath  standing  by  his  own 
baptismal  font  in  his  beloved  church  of  San  Giovanni, 
the  font  which,  to  the  horror  of  formalists,  he  had  once 
(it  is  said)  unhesitatingly  broken  to  save  a  drowning 
child.  He  was  offered,  indeed,  to  return,  but  under  con- 


302 


Dante. 


ditions  which  he  disdained.  "  The  stars  and  the  heaven," 
he  said,  "are  everywhere;  and  in  any  region  under 
heaven  I  can  ponder  the  sweetest  truths  ;  and  if  I  can- 
not return  with  perfect  honor,  I  will  not  return  at 
all."  Yet  how  hard  was  that  path  !  how  bitter  that 
lot  to  his  intensely  proud  and  pre-eminent  spirit ! 
What  the  cage  is  to  tlie  mountain  eagle,  that  was  to 
Dante  the  dangling  as  a  dependant  about  the  courts  of 
little  men.  Is  it  wonderful  that  bitter  words  sometimes 
escaped  him  ?  "  How  is  it,"  said  his  magnificent  pa- 
tron, Can  Grande,  to  him  one  day,  "that  a  poor  fool, 
like  my  jester,  amuses  us  all  so  much,  while  a  wise  man 
like  you,  day  after  day,  has  nothing  to  amuse  us  with  ?  " 
"It  is  not  strange,"  said  Dante  bitterly.  "Remember 
the  proverb,  like  to  like."  One  day  the  Prior  of  Santa 
Croce,  struck  with  the  far-off  look  in  his  yearning  eyes, 
asked  him  "  what  he  was  seeking."  "  Pace!  "  was  the 
answer.  "  Peace  ! "  a  peace  which  on  earth,  alas,  he 
never  found.  He  went  on  an  embassy  to  Venice  for  his 
last  patron,  the  Lord  of  Eavenna  ;  and  not  being  able 
even  to  obtain  an  audience,  he  returned  to  Ravenna 
overwhelmed  with  disappointment,  and  died  at  the  age 
of  fifty-six  of  a  broken  heart.  A  century  later  remorse- 
ful Florence  begged  that  his  remains  might  be  restored 
to  her ;  but  the  request,  though  renewed  still  later  by 
Leo  X.  and  Michael  Angelo,  was  rightly  refused  ;  and 
at  Ravenna,  on  the  bleak  Adrian  shore,  and  near  the 
blighted  pine- woods,  his  dust  sleeps  until  the  Judgment 
Day. 

Those  pine-woods  were  green  then,  though  they  are 
blighted  now  ;  and  Dante's  life  which  was  so  blighted 
for  himself  has  put  forth  green  leaves  for  us.   His  loss 


Dante. 


303 


was  our  gain.  But  for  that  long  exile,  but  for  that  un- 
utterable despair  and  weariness  of  heart,  he  might  have 
been  a  graceful  love-poet,  or  a  scholastic  philosopher, 
but  he  never  would  have  written  for  all  time  the  Divine 
Comedy.    Like  many  other  poets  he  was 

"  Nurtured  into  poetry  by  wrong, 
And  learnt  in  suffering  what  he  taught  in  song." 

If  the  myrrh  gave  forth  its  immortal  fragrance,  it  was 
because  it  was  incensed  and  crushed.  If  the  gold  was 
fine  gold,  it  was  because  heaven  had  purged  it  in  the 
furnace  and  fretted  it  into  forms  of  eternal  loveliness. 

The  name,  "Divine,"  was  given  to  his  poem  after 
his  death,  because  it  dealt  with  the  most  sacred  topics. 
He  himself  called  it  a  "  Comedy,"  partly  because  it  had 
a  happy  ending,  partly  because  it  was  written  in  a  simple 
style  and  in  the  vernacular  tongue.  It  sums  up  all  that 
was  greatest  in  previous,  poetry  and  religious  thought. 
It  is  a  vision  ;  an  ideal ;  an  autobiography  ;  a  satire  ;  an 
allegory  ;  a  moral  exhortation.  There  had  been  visions 
of  the  unseen  world  in  Homer  and  Virgil  and  in  many 
mediaeval  works  ;  there  had  been  autobiographies  like 
the  "Confessions"  of  St.  Augustine  ;  and  bitter  political 
poems  like  the  plays  of  Aristophanes  and  the  satires  of 
Juvenal ;  and  poems  full  of  scientific  and  theological 
knowledge  like  those  of  Lucretius  ;  and  ideals  of  perfect 
conditions  like  St.  Augustine's  "City  of  God."  But  in 
Dante's  poem  all  these  elements  are  fused  by  imagina- 
tion into  one  intense  whole,  and  made  the  vehicles  of 
the  deepest  religious  thoughts  which  at  that  day  were 
known  to  man.  Without  a  moment's  hesitation  Dante 
claims  his  eternal  place  among  the  very  greatest  poets 


304 


Dafite. 


who  had  gone  before  him,  "as  though  some  stranger 
had  appeared  at  the  ancient  games,  and  at  once  flung  to 
its  farthest  cast  the  quoit  of  the  demi-gods."  Nor 
has  the  "Divine  Comedy"  ever  been  equalled  since. 
Wordsworth's  "  Excursion  "  is  a  philosophical  and  au- 
tobiographic poem;  Goethe's  "  Faust "  is  a  soul's  his- 
tory ;  Bunyan's  "  Pilgrim's  Progress "  is  a  vision  of 
things  unseen  ;  Milton's  "  Paradise  Lost  "  deals  with  God 
and  Satan  and  Heaven  and  Hell ;  but  Dante's  "  Divina 
Commedia"  is  a  work  incomparably  greater  than  Words- 
worth's or  Bunyan's  or  Goethe's,  great  as  those  are  ;  it 
is  greater  even  than  the  "Paradise  Lost."  Except, 
perhaps,  the  plays  of  Shakespeare,  which  may  be  greater 
in  their  oceanic  and  myriad-minded  genius,  it  is  perhaps 
the  supremest  product  which  has  come  from  the  intel- 
lect of  man. 

But  in  reading  Dante  we  must  not  at  all  suppose 
that  we  shall  be  able  at  once  to  grasp,  and  to  admire 
him.  Great  poems  require  a  severe  and  noble  tone  and 
temper  of  mind  to  understand  them.  The  eminent 
man  who  said  that  of  its  three  parts,  the  "Inferno" 
was  revolting,  the  "Purgatorio"  dull,  and  the  "  Para- 
diso"  unreadable,  condemned  not  Dante,  but  himself. 
If  men  prefer  to  make  their  entrances  and  exits  on 
the  stage  of  life  with  clowns  and  vices,  they  are  not  fit 
companions  for  those  "  whose  worth  erects  them  and 
their  actions  to  a  grave  and  tragic  bearing."  Dante 
never  desired  more  than  fit  audience,  though  few. 
You  will  find  much  in  his  poem  to  scarify  a  feeble 
conventionality.  He  himself  warns  ofE  all  base  and 
feeble  readers.  "Ye,"  he  says,  "who,  in  your  little 
boat,  are  eager  to  follow  in  the  track  of  my  bark, 


Da7tte. 


305 


which  speeds,  singing  on  its  way,  turn  back  to  see  again 
your  own  shores.  Trust  not  yourselves  to  tlie  deep, 
lest  haply,  losing  me,  ye  remain  bewildered.  Ye  other 
few,  who  look  up  betimes  for  the  bread  of  the  angels, 
on  which  we  can  live  here,  but  not  enough  to  satisfy  ; 
ye,  ere  the  quickly  closing  wake  is  reunited, 

"  'Mid  the  deep  ocean  ye  your  course  may  take. 
My  track  pursuing  the  pure  waters  through." 

The  vision  narrated  in  Dante's  "Divine  Comedy" 
is  supposed  to  liave  happened  in  the  year  1300.  Dante 
was  then  thirty-five.  "  In  the  middle  of  the  journey  of 
our  life,"  so  it  begins,  "I  found  myself  astray  in  a  dark 
wood,  for  the  straight  way  was  lost.  Ah  !  how  hard  a 
thing  it  is  to  tell  how  wild,  and  rough,  and  stubborn 
this  wood  was,  which,  in  thinking  of  it,  renews  my  fear, 
bitter  almost  as  death."  And  while  he  has  thus  lost  his 
way,  and  lost  Him  who  is  the  way,  in  this  erroneous 
wood  of  confused  aim  and  sinful  wandering — the  wood 
in  which  most  of  us,  alas  !  spend  all  our  lives — he 
reaches  the  foot  of  a  hill  whose  summit  was  bathed  in 
sunshine.  The  liill  is  the  high  ground,  the  Delectable 
Mountain  of  faith,  of  holiness,  of  moral  order,  of  Chris- 
tian life  ;  and  from  the  pass  that  leads  to  death  Dante 
turns  to,  and  makes  a  strenuous  effort  to  climb  the 
hill.  But  he  is  instantly  hindered  by  three  wild  beasts  : 
a  bright  and  bounding  leopard,  with  spotted  skin,  of 
which  he  admires  the  beauty  ;  a  lion,  which  approaches 
him  with  head  erect  and  furious  hunger  ;  and  a  gaunt 
she-wolf  that  looks  full  of  all  cravings  in  her  leanness. 
Terrified  by  these  wild  beasts,  lie  sees  a  figure  approach 
him,  to  whom  he  appeals  for  help.  This  figure  is  the 
20 


306 


Dante, 


poet  Virgil,  who,  after  dwelling  on  his  peril,  tells  him 
that  he  must  follow  him.  Now,  the  poem  of  Dante  is 
crowded  by  many  meanings,  but  the  chief  of  these,  and 
the  only  one  which  I  shall  touch  upon,  is  the  moral  alle- 
gory. Of  the  beasts  that  would  fain  drive  Dante  back 
from  the  sunny  liill  to  the  dark  wood,  the  leopard  is 
pleasure  ;  the  lion  is  anger ;  the  wolf  is  the  love  of 
money.  "  Behold  a  lion  out  of  the  forest  shall  slay 
them,  a  wolf  of  the  evenings  shall  spoil  them, 
a  leopard  shall  watch  over  their  cities."*  Sen- 
suality, passion,  avarice  —  these  have  to  be  con- 
quered before  a  man  can  become  a  true  follower  of 
Christ,  or  climb  the  mountain  of  His  beatitudes.  Virgil 
is  the  personification  of  human  wisdom — the  spirit  of 
imagination  and  poetry— able  to  witness  to  duty,  its 
discipline,  its  hopes,  and  its  -vindications,  but  unable  to 
confer  grace.  And  Virgil  tells  Dante  that,  at  the  bid- 
ding of  his  Beatrice,  who  becomes  henceforth  the  per- 
sonification of  Divine  knowledge,  he  is  commissioned 
to  lead  him  through  Hell  where  sin  is  punished,  and 
through  Purgatory  where  sins  are  cleansed.  In  order 
to  be  delivered  from  the  seductions  and  semblances  of 
life,  Dante  is  to  be  led  to  see,  with  his  own  eyes,  the 
awful  eternal  realities.  Thus  the  "  Divine  Comedy  " 
comprehends  all  time  and  all  space.  It  represents  the 
life-history  of  a  human  soul,  redeemed  from  sin,  error, 
from  lust,  and  wrath,  and  mammon,  and  restored  to 
the  right  path  by  the  reason  and  the  grace  which  en- 
able him  to  see  the  things  that  are,  and  to  see  them  as 
they  are. 


*  See  Jerem, 


Dante. 


307 


Of  the  three  great  divisions  of  the  poem,  it  is  of  course, 
only  possible  to  offer  you  the  barest  outlines,  and  that 
solely  for  the  sake  of  the  remarks  which  I  have  to 
make  respecting  them. 

Together  the  two  poets  reach  a  gate,  over  whose  sum- 
mit runs,  in  dark  letters,  the  inscription  : 

"  All  hope  abandon,  ye  who  enter  here  ; " 

and  Dante  weeps  as  he  passes  into  a  dolorous  realm 
where  sighs,  and  lamentations,  and  voices  deep  and 
hoarse,  and  the  sounds  of  smitten  hands  re-echo  through 
the  stained  and  startled  air.  Here,  on  the  Vestibule  of 
Hell,  are  the  fallen  angels  who  were  faithful  neither  to 
God  nor  to  Satan,  but  only  to  themselves  ;  and  with  them 
swept  round  and  round  the  doleful  circle,  naked,  stung 
by  hornets,  with  faces  stained  with  tears  and  blood,  fol- 
lowing in  countless  multitudes  the  fluttering  flag  of 
Acheron,  are  all  the  wretched  caitiffs,  displeasing  alike 
to  God  and  to  His  enemies,  who  had  died  but  never  lived. 
Mercy  and  judgment  alike  disdain  them.  Heaven  chases 
forth  their  ugliness ;  Hell  spurns  their  selfish  pusilla- 
nimity. "Let  us  not  speak  of  them,"  says  Virgil,  "but 
look  and  pass." 

Here  you  have  Dante's  central  idea,  that  Hell  is  self- 
ishness ;  the  human  will  set  up  in  defiance  of  the  divine. 
The  "Inferno"  throughout  is  the  history  of  self-will  in 
its  lower  and  lower  stages  of  development.  The  soul  in 
Cocytus  is  utterly  emptied  of  God,  and  wholly  filled 
with  the  loathly  emptiness  of  self  ;  in  the  "  Purgatory" 
the  soul  is  gradually  emptied  of  self  ;  in  the  "  Paradise  " 
the  soul  is  wholly  filled  with  God. 

Then,  after  the  sad,  but  not  tormented.  Limbo  of 


3o8 


Dante. 


unbaptized  infants  and  the  virtuous  heathen,  the  Hell 
of  Dante  is  divided  into  three  sections,  according  to  the 
three  all-inclusive  sins.  Those  sins  are  Lust,  Hate, 
Fraud.  There  is  the  Upper  Hell,  the  Hell  of  Inconti- 
nence ;  the  Central  Hell,  the  Hell  of  Malice ;  the 
Nether  Hell,  the  Hell  of  Fraud  and  Treachery,  in  the 
lowest  pit  of  which  is  Satan  himself.  The  two  poets, 
seeing  and  conversing  with  many  lost  souls,  traverse  the 
nine  circles.  They  see  the  Impure,  swept  round  and 
round,  without  respite,  by  a  hellish  storm,  in  a  circle  of 
darkness  which  bellows  like  the  sea  in  a  tempest  beaten 
by  horrid  winds.  They  see  the  Gluttons  and  Epicures, 
their  bellies  cleaving  to  the  dust,  terrified  by  a  barking 
monster,  and  beaten  by  a  foul,  eternal,  heavy  rain  in 
the  poisonous  air.  They  see  the  Misers  and  the  Spend- 
thrifts, rolling  hi^ge  stones  undisceruibly  in  the  howling 
gloom.  They  see  the  Wrathful  and  the  gloomy-sluggish 
tearing  each  other  in  the  slime  of  the  Stygian  marsh. 
In  the  red-hot  city  of  Dis,  guarded  by  Fiends  and 
Furies,  and  reserved  for  Brutalism,  that  is,  for  besotted 
intellectual  folly,  they  see  imprisoned  in  burning  tombs 
the  souls  of  Heretics  and  Infidels.  Then  in  the  Central 
Hell,  the  Hell  of  Malice,  separated  from  the  upper  by  a 
chaos  of  shattered  rocks,  are  those  who  have  sinned  by 
violence — against  themselves,  against  their  neighbors, 
and  against  God.  Here  are  the  Tyrants  and  Murderers, 
immersed  in  the  boiling,  crimson  waves  of  Phlegethon. 
Here  is  the  ghastly  wood  of  the  Suicides,  haunted  by 
the  obscene  Harpies  of  Despair  and  Misery.  Here  the 
blasphemers  against  God,  and  all  who  have  violated  the 
law  of  nature,  pace  the  scorchings  and  under  a  slow  rain 
of  ceaseless  fire.  At  this  point  the  stream  of  Phlegethon 


Dante. 


309 


plunges  into  the  abyss  in  "a  Niagara  of  blood,"  and  the 
serpent-monster  Geryon  carries  them  into  the  Nether 
Hell — the  Hell  of  Fraud.  Here,  in  every  variety  of 
shame,  horror,  and  anguish,  weltering  in  a  lake  of 
pitch  ;  or  hanging,  head  downward,  in  tombs,  while 
from  toe  to  heel  a  flame  flickers  unceasingly  along  the 
soles  of  their  quivering  feet ;  or  crushed  under  cloaks  of 
gilded  lead ;  or  hewn  to  pieces ;  or  tettered  with  lep- 
rosy ;  or  wrapped  in  tongues  of  flame  he  sees  the  souls 
of  all  who  have  sinned  by  Falsity — seducers,  flatterers, 
simonists,  diviners,  usurers,  hypocrites,  thieves,  falsi- 
fiers, breeders  of  evil  discord,  and  all  liars.  Down  one 
more  chasm  they  descend  to  the  lowest  Hell,  the  pool  of 
Cocytus,  locked  up  in  eternal  frost  by  blasts  from  the 
vampire  wings  of  Lucifer — the  blasts  of  Envy,  Impo- 
tence, and  Eage.  There,  in  those  "  thrilling  regions  of 
thick-ribbed  ice,"  frozen  into  that  glassy  lake  in  an  agony 
which  makes  their  faces  livid  and  dog-like,  and  congeals 
their  very  tears,  he  finds  the  souls  of  those  traitors  who 
have  betrayed  their  friends,  their  country,  or  their  bene- 
factors. It  is  a  Hell  of  Ice,  not  of  Fire; — "to  show," 
it  has  been  said,  that  "the  most  dreadful  thing  in 
treachery  is  not  the  fraud  but  the  cold-heartedness  of 
it,"  and  that  is  the  reason  why,  "the  eyes,  once  cruelly 
tearless,  are  now  blind  with  frozen  tears."  Lowest  of 
all,  with  three  faces — one  crimson  with  rage,  one  black 
with  ignorance,  one  yellow  with  envy — Dante  sees  the 
Archtraitor,  Satan  himself ;  and,  grasping  the  shaggy 
fell  of  his  frozen  and  bat-like  wings,  the  poets  climb  up 
through  an  opening  in  the  solid  earth,  until  catching  a 
glimpse  of  the  beauteous  things  which  heaven  bears, 
they  issue  forth  to  see  once  more  the  stars. 


Dante. 


Now  I  would  ask  you  to  remember  that  this  is  only  the 
crudest  outline  of  the  poem,  undiversified  by  its  human 
elements,  its  constant  pathos,  its  oft-recurring  touches 
of  insight  and  nobleness.  I  have  not  attempted  to  give 
you  any  conception  either  of  its  terrifically  realistic 
touches  or  of  its  numberless  relieving  elements.  But 
"what  we  ought  to  learn  from  its  intense  moral  purpose  is 
to  see  evil  as  Dante  had  seen  it ;  to  feel  the  same  hatred 
and  fierce  scorn  of  sin  wherewith  God  had  inspired  him  ; 
to  feel,  as  he  felt,  that  sin,  whether  it  takes  the  forms  of 
malice,  fraud,  or  lust,  is  foul  and  horrid.  He  sets  siu 
before  us  both  in  its  nature  and  in  its  punishment ;  now 
thrilling  us  with  fear;  now  melting  us  with  pity;  now 
freezing  us  with  horror  ;  now  making  us  feel  aflame  with 
indignation — but  meaning  always  to  set  before  us  this 
lesson  more  than  any  other,  that  sin  is  Hell,  and  that  the 
wilful,  willing  sinner  is  in  Hell ;  and  that  so  long  as  he 
remains  an  alien  from  the  love  of  God  he  must  say,  with 
the  evil  spirit, 

"  What  matter  where,  if  I  be  still  the  same?" 

The  vulgar  conception  of  punishment  is  that  it  is  some- 
thing external  to  and  apart  from  sin.  Dante's  concep- 
tion is  that  penalty  is  the  same  thing  as  sin  :  it  is  only 
sin  taken  at  a  later  stage  of  its  history. 

Lot  me  try  to  show  you,  by  one  or  two  instances,  bow 
full  this  poem  is  of  tremendous  lessons. 

i.  First,  observe  the  fearful  illustration  which  it  fur- 
nishes of  St.  Paul's  words  :  "What  fellowship  has  light 
with  darkness  ?  "  Wishing  to  represent  sin  as  awful  and 
ghastly,  Dante  beautifies  his  "Inferno  "  with  no  bright- 
ening touch.     The  name  of  Christ  is  never  mentioned 


Dante. 


in  the  poem,  as  thougli  its  accents  were  too  blessed  to 
be  uttered  in  that  polluted  air.  One  Angel  only  appears 
in  it  to  drive  back  the  demons  who  would  oppose  the 
poet's  entrance  into  the  burning  city.  But  how  unlike  he 
is  to  the  J3ivine  birds — the  radiant,  tender,  love-breath- 
ing Angels  of  the  "  Purgatorio  "  and  the  "  Paradiso  !  " 
Through  the  gloom  the  poets  see  more  than  a  thousand 
ruined  spirits  flying,  like  frogs  before  the  waterwake, 
at  the  face  of  one  who,  with  un wetted  feet,  is  speeding 
over  the  Stygian  marsh.  He  perpetually  moves  his  left 
hand  before  him,  as  though  he  would  wave  off  from  his 
countenance  the  gross  air  of  the  abyss.  He  speaks  no 
syllable  to  the  Poets,  as  they  bow  to  him  in  reverence, 
but  stands,  disdainful,  indignant,  on  the  horrid  thresh- 
old, taunting  the  outcasts  of  Heaven  ;  and  when,  with 
one  touch  of  his  wand,  he  has  burst  open  the  burning 
gates,  he  speaks  no  further  syllable,  but  speeds  back, 
swift  and  disdainful,  through  the  filthy  gloom.  There 
can  be  no  brightness,  no  beauty  there ;  no  Angel  can 
wave  his  purple  wings  in  the  atmosphere  of  Hell.  Dante 
anticipated  by  six  centuries  the  scientific  doctrine  of 
modification  by  environment.  If  they  are  forced  to 
enter  Hell,  even  for  a  few  moments,  his  very  Angels 
become  unangelic.  And,  in  illustration  of  the  same 
truth,  notice  how  revoltingly  hideous,  how  horrible  in 
his  loathliness,  Dante  has  made  his  Lucifer.  He  is  not 
the  haughty,  splendid,  defiant  Satan  of  Milton,  standing 

"Like  Teneriffe  or  Atlas,  unremoved," 

and  even  in  his  fall  seeming  not  "less  than  Archangel 
ruined  or  excess  of  glory  obscured."  Nor  is  he  the 
mocking,  gibing,  flickering,  philosophic,  gentlemanly 


312 


Dante. 


Mephistopheles  of  Goethe.  No ;  but,  with  far  deeper 
moral  insight,  he  is  a  hideous,  foul,  three-headed,  shud- 
der-causing monster — a  portent  at  whose  foulness  the 
solid  earth  recoils. 

ii.  Notice  next  the  awful  power  with  which  Dante 
illustrates  the  truth  that  men  become  what  they  desire ; 
that  penalty  bears  most  often  a  ghastly  similitude  to  the 
vice  whereby  it  was  caused  ;  that  "  wherewithal  a  man 
sinneth,  by  the  same  also  shall  he  be  punished."  If  in 
Dante  sensual  sinners  are  swept  along  a  whirling  storm, 
what  is  that  storm  but  the  unbridled  passions  of  those 
that  lawless  and  uncertain  thoughts  imagine  howling  ? 
If  yet  worse  carnal  offenders  are  baked  by  slow-heating 
flakes  of  fire,  are  not  the  thoughts  of  a  corrupted  heart 
full  of  such  unhallowed  flames  ?  If  his  gluttons  lie 
prostrate  in  the  slush,  tormented  by  Cerberus,  what  is 
gluttony  and  drunkenness  but  "on  thy  belly  shalt  thou 
go,  and  dust  shalt  thou  eat  all  the  days  of  thy  life  ?" 
If  his  hypocrites  are  like  the  monks  of  Cologne,  with 
their  huge  hoods,  which  display  from  afar  their  dazzling 
falsity,  what  is  hypocrisj",  with  its  fringes  and  phylac- 
teries, but  such  a  cloak  of  gilded  lead  ?  If  his  misers 
are  plunged  in  a  lake  of  foul  pitch,  what  is  that  lake 
but  money  basely  gained  and  sordidly  spent  and  selfishly 
amassed  ? — money  which  sticks  to  the  fingers  and  defiles 
the  mind  and  causes  it  to  bubble  up  and  down  with 
excitement  and  depression,  and  the  sighing  of  souls 
which  cannot  be  satisfied  ?  What  is  the  frozen  pool  of 
Cocytus  but  the  heart  benumbed  with  cruel  and  treach- 
erous selfishness  ?  Are  there  no  living  men,  who,  in 
the  truth  of  things,  unless  they  repent,  are  doomed  to 
such  places  hereafter  because  such  places  are  their  own 


Dante. 


313 


place  ?  Nay,  who  are  in  such  places  now  ?  Is  vice  dead, 
or  has  it  ceased  to  be  in  its  inmost  nature  grotesque  and 
vile  ?  Are  there  no  living  usurers,  traitors,  liars,  furious, 
sluggards,  seducers,  slanderers,  evil  counsellors  in  high 
places  and  in  low  places,  whom  a  Dante  of  this  day — 
were  he  brave  enougli  or  had  enough  of  moral  insight — 
would  doom  to  such  scenes  now  as  he  did  six  centuries 
ago  ?  If  so,  Dante  has  some  very  stern  and  very  need- 
ful lessons  for  us  as  for  the  men  in  days  in  which  he 
lived.  Do  men  in  these  days  need  no  warning  against 
vulgar,  meaningless,  facing-both-ways  lives  ?  Are  none 
of  us  stung  by  the  wasps  of  mean  cares  ?  Do  none  of 
us  trim  and  shuffle  in  the  wake  of  popular  opinion, 
following  it  like  some  giddy  and  fluttering  rag  of  Ach- 
eron ?  Are  none  of  us  tempted,  like  these  wretches,  to 
stand  selfishly  neutral  in  the  great  conflict  between  good 
and  evil  ?  Have  none  of  us  made,  like  the  young  ruler, 
the  great  refusal  ? 

iii.  Next,  I  would  ask  you  to  consider  the  awful  and 
almost  lurid  light  which  Dante  has  flung  on  his  own 
meaning  in  the  33d  canto.  There,  in  the  lowest  circle, 
frozen  in  the  icy  pool,  the  poets  see  a  lost  spirit  who 
entreats  them  to  remove  from  his  eyes  the  dreadful, 
glassy  congealment  which,  while  permitting  sight,  in- 
creases torment  by  rendering  tears  impossible.  Dante 
asks  who  he  is,  and  finds  that  he  is  Friar  Alberigo, 
who,  with  horrible  treachery,  has  murdered  his  own 
guests  at  a  banquet.  Bat  Dante  knows  that  Alberigo  is 
alive,  and  asks  with  surprise  how  he  comes  to  be  here  ? 
He  receives  the  fearful  answer,  that  when  souls  have 
committed  crimes  so  deadly  as  his,  they  instantly  fall 
rushing  down  to  that  lowest  pit,  leaving  their  bodies 


314 


Dante. 


upon  earth.  From  that  moment  they  are  really  dead. 
Their  body,  indeed,  all  unknown  to  them,  eats,  drinks, 
sleeps,  seems  to  live  on  earth.  But  their  soul  is  not  in 
it ;  it  is  but  a  mask  of  clay  which  a  demon  animates. 
And  lie  proceeds  to  mention  others  whom  Dante  has 
seen  in  hell,  which  still  seem  to  be  alive  on  earth,  hav- 
ing a  name  to  live  though  they  are  dead — being  the 
most  awful  kind  of  ghosts,  not  souls  without  bodies, 
but  bodies  without  souls.  Is  not  the  world  full  of  such 
ghosts — of  those  who  "  have  a  name  to  live  while  they 
are  dead,"  of  men  and  women  who  living  in  pleasure, 
are  "dead  while  they  live" — not  disembodied  souls,  but 
disensouled  bodies,  flitting  about  their  living  tombs  of 
selfishness  and  vice  ?  The  fourteenth  century,  you  see, 
had  not  yet  learned  to  legitimize  vice  by  comjilacent 
doctrines.  To  Dante  sin  was  not  a  thing  to  make  a 
mock  at.  His  Cerberus,  and  his  horned  demons,  and 
his  red-hot  cities,  and  his  boiling  blood  of  Phlegethon, 
and  his  snow  of  scorching  flames,  are  but  the  shadow 
and  reflex  of  men's  vices,  crimes,  and  sins, 

iv.  Again  observe  that  in  Dante's  Hell  each  soul  is 
condemned  for  one  sin,  and  mainly  for  one  definite  act 
of  sin  ;  whereas  you  will  say  that  sins  are  complex 
and  manifold,  and  enmeshed  together  by  links  subtle 
and  numberless.  But  Dante  is  awfully  right  here  also. 
It  is  true  that  no  man  is  ever  contented  with  a  single 
sin  ;  yet  it  is  always  one  sin,  and  that  the  favorite  one, 
which  destroys  souls.  That  conquered,  all  otiiers  fall 
with  it ;  that  victorious,  all  others  follow  it.  The  lust 
and  anger  of  the  flesh  do  not  of  necessity  or  finally  de- 
stroy ;  but  when  they  become  the  lust  and  anger  of  the 
heart,  "  these,"  says  Mr.  Ruskin,  "  are  the  furies  of  Phle- 


Dante. 


315 


gethon,  wholly  ruinous.  Lord  of  these,  on  the  shattered 
rocks,  lies  couched  the  infamy  of  Crete,  For  when  the 
heart  as  well  as  the  flesh  desires  what  it  should  not,  and 
the  heart  as  well  as  the  flesh  kindles  to  its  wrath,  the 
whole  man  is  corrupted,  and  his  heart's  blood  is  fed  in 
its  veins  from  the  lake  of  fire."  The  single  consumma- 
tions of  sin  which,  with  a  glare  of  unnatural  illumina- 
tion, reveal  to  the  man  what  he  is,  are  never  single 
acts,  but  are  the  epitome  of  long  years  of  sin,  indulged 
in  thought  and  wish,  and  minor  offences  ;  just  as  the 
crimson  flower  of  the  fabled  aloe  issues  from  the  sap, 
which  has  been  circling  in  its  leaves  for  a  hundred  years. 

II.  Time  does  not  permit  me  to  give  you  even  an  out- 
line of  the  Purgatory.  It  is  the  mountain  where  sins 
which  have  been  repented  of  before  death,  are  washed 
away.  We  have  left  behind  us  forever  the  horror  and 
the  infamy,  the  noisome  gloom,  the  agonizing  frost,  the 
mephitic  rivers  of  boiling  blood.  No  sooner  have  the 
Poets  reached  the  upper  light,  than  their  eyes  are  glad- 
dened with  the  sweet  hue  of  the  Eastern  sapphire, 
deepened  to  the  far  horizon  in  the  pure  serenity  of  air. 
Overhead  shine  the  four  stars  of  the  Southern  Cross ; 
and  bidden  by  Cato,  the  guardian  of  the  ante-Purga- 
tory, where  those  sinners  are  detained  wlio  have  delayed 
their  repentance.  Virgil  and  Dante  come  to  a  shady 
place,  where  first  they  catch  the  tremulous  shimmer  of 
the  sea,  and  Virgil,  placing  his  hands  on  the  ground, 
bathes  in  dew  the  cheeks  of  Dante,  stained  as  they  are 
with  tears,  and  with  the  mirk  of  the  abyss,  and  girds 
him  with  a  rush,  the  emblem  of  humility.  Round  the 
mountain  of  Purgatory  run  nine  terraces,  of  which  each 
is  devoted  to  the  punishment  of  one  of  the  seven  deadly 


3i6 


Dante. 


sins.  The  penance  is,  on  each  terrace,  analogous  to  the 
sin.  The  proud  crawl  along,  bent  under  huge  weights. 
The  once  evil  eyes  of  the  envious  are  sewn  together  with 
iron  wire.  The  angry  grope  their  way  through  a  dense, 
bitter,  blinding  fog.  The  slothful  are  hurried  round 
and  round  in  incessant  toil.  The  avaricious  lie  pros- 
trate and  weeping  on  the  earth.  The  gluttons  and 
drunkards  are  punished  by  the  emaciation  of  perpetual 
hunger.  The  sensual  expiate  their  carnal  wickedness 
in  burning  flame.  Dante  has  to  pass  through  each 
terrace — yes,  even  through  that  burning  flame.  He 
shrinks  from  it,  indeed,  with  a  death-like  horror. 
"When  I  was  within  it,"  he  says,  "I  would  have  flung 
myself  into  molten  glass  to  cool  me,  so  immeasurable 
was  the  burning  there."  But  thenceforth  he  is  cleansed 
from  sin.  He  is  crowned  and  mitred  over  himself. 
He  finds  himself  under  the  leaves  of  a  forest,  tremulous 
with  soft  breezes,  and  resonant  with  the  song  of  birds, 
where,  amid  May  blossoms,  flows  a  stream  of  purest 
crystal.  A  gleam  flashes  through  the  forest,  a  sweet 
melody  runs  through  the  glowing  air ;  and  he  sees  a 
glorious  vision  of  the  triumph  of  Christ  and  His 
Church,  and,  in  it,  amid  a  cloud  of  flowers  shed  by  the 
hands  of  Angels,  his  blood  thrills  to  recognize  a  lady 
whose  white  veil  is  crowned  with  olive.  It  is  Beatrice. 
Virgil  has  vanished,  for  human  wisdom  can  do  no  more. 
And,  as  he  weeps  for  Virgil's  departure,  Beatrice  bids 
him  rather  weep  for  his  own  past  sins,  and,  towering  over 
him  in  imperious  attitude,  like  a  mother  over  a  son  who 
is  in  fault,  she  reproaches  him  so  sternly  for  the  backslid- 
ings  of  the  past,  that  the  Angels,  as  though  indirectly 
pleading  for  him  with  the  beautiful,  stern  monitress,  sud- 


Dante. 


317 


denly  begin  the  strain  :  "In  thee,  0  Lord,  hath  been 
my  hope."  Then  his  heart  breaks  like  melting  ice  into 
sighs  and  tears,  and  he  stands  mutely  listening  to  her 
reproaches,  like  a  boy  ashamed  of  guilt,  with  his  eyes 
upon  the  ground,  and  at  last  falls  down  in  a  swoon. 
Then  at  last,  truly,  utterly  penitent,  he  is  plunged  in 
the  waters  of  Lethe.  He  hears  the  angels  sing  "  Thou 
shalt  wash  me,  and  I  shall  be  whiter  than  snow."  The 
four  Virtues  receive  him.  He  is  bidden  to  gaze  on 
Beatrice,  and  sees  the  light  of  Christ  reflected  in  her 
eyes.  Then  he  is  suffered  to  drink  the  waters  of 
Eunoe,  which  is  sweeter  than  words  can  tell ;  and 
refreshed  like  young  plants  which  are  reclad  by  spring 
in  tender  leaves,  he  issues  from  the  holy  wave  purified, 
and  ready  to  mount  up  to  the  stars. 

The  "  Purgatory  "  of  Dante  represents  a  present  real- 
ity, not  a  future  possibility.  It  is  the  history  of  a  proc- 
ess, not  the  description  of  a  i)lace.  There  is  scarcely  a 
page  of  this  magnificent  poem  which  is  not  full  of  subtle 
allegories  and  noble  lessons.  Gladly,  had  time  per- 
mitted, would  I  have  endeavored  to  show  the  mighty 
compression  of  imagination  with  which  Dante  conveys 
a  manifold  instruction  in  passage  after  passage,  and 
how  he  sometimes  condenses  a  supreme  truth  into  a 
single  smiting  line.  As  it  is,  I  can  only  point  out  one 
central  lesson  of  the  entire  poem. 

It  is  that  just  punishment,  though  hard  to  bear,  is 
yet  very  blessed.  Into  the  theology  of  Dante  we  will 
not  enter,  but  at  least  he  enforces  on  us  the  lesson  that 
forgiveness  of  sins  is  not  the  same  thing  as  remission  of 
consequences.  The  spirits  of  Purgatory  are  all  ready 
to  say  with  the  modern  poet, 


3i8 


Dante. 


"  Ah!  not  the  nectarous  poppy  lovers  use, 
Not  daily  labor's  dull  Lethean  spring. 
Oblivion  in  lost  angels  can  infuse 

Of  the  soiled  glory  or  the  trailing  wing." 

The  spirits  in  Purgatory  are  happy,  for  they  have 
hope.  They  yearn  for  the  presence  of  God,  but  do  not 
desire  their  punishment  to  be  shortened.  They  do  not 
desire,  they  do  not  feel  worthy  to  see  God  till  the  soft 
plumes  of  angels  have  brushed  from  their  foreheads  all 
trace  of  the  seven  deadly  letters.  The  sense  of  shame, 
the  sense  of  justice  prevail  with  them.  The  blush  of 
the  carnal  sinners  in  the  seventh  terrace  of  fire  adds  to 
the  flame  a  yet  fiercer  glow ;  and  when  they  converse 
with  Dante,  they  will  not  lean  so  much  as  one  inch  out 
of  the  healing  fire,  because  they  do  not  desire  one  mo- 
ment's respite  from  the  agony  which  is  purging  away 
their  sin.  When  the  poet  Guido  has  finished  speaking 
with  Dante,  he  vanishes  in  the  flames  as  a  fish  darts  to 
the  bottom  of  the  water.  Surely  there  is  a  deep  lesson 
here.    It  is  the  lesson  that 

"Hearts  which  verily  repent 
Are  burdened  with  impurity, 

And  comforted  by  chastisement. 
That  punishment's  the  best  to  bear 

Which  follows  soonest  on  the  sin, 
And  guilt's  a  game  where  losers  fare 

Better  than  those  who  seem  to  win." 

I  will  make  but  one  more  remark  about  the  "  Purga- 
torio  "  before  I  pass  on  to  say  very  few  words  about  the 
"Paradiso."  It  is,  as  my  friend  Dean  Plumptre  has 
well  pointed  out,  that  the  poem  is  intensely  autobio- 
graphical.    It  contains  the  confessions  of  the  man 


Dante. 


319 


Dante  Alighieri.  Wo  see  in  it  the  sins  to  which  he  had 
been,  and  to  which  he  had  not  been  tempted.  The 
man  so  proud,  so  reserved,  so  reticent,  so  craving  of 
praise,  so  sensitive  to  blame,  here  like  St.  Augustine, 
and  like  Rousseau,  lays  bare  the  secrets  of  his  soul.  In 
the  31st  canto,  the  words  of  Beatrice  are  the  reproaches 
of  his  own  transfigured  and  illuminated  conscience.  And 
we  watch  with  deepest  interest  the  gradual  cleansing 
and  dilatation  of  his  soul.  In  the  "■  Inferno  "  the  con- 
tact with  evil,  and  even  with  the  Nemesis  which  falls 
on  evil,  had  not  been  without  its  own  deadly  perils. 
He  feels  the  taint  of  the  vices  on  which  he  looks. 
He  becomes  half  base  as  he  listens  to  the  revilings  of 
the  base ;  half  false  among  the  treacherous  ;  savagely 
relentless  among  the  furious.  In  the  "  Purgatory"  and 
the  "Paradise"  he  has  to  be  cleansed  fi-om  this  blackness 
of  infection.  And  he  is  so,  in  part,  by  the  outward 
influences  of  all  things  sweet,  lovely,  and  ennobling. 
By  the  clear  reminiscences  of  history  and  literature  ;  by 
the  exquisite  and  consummate  fidelity  of  Art,  especially 
of  sculpture ;  by  Poetry,  especially  sacred  poetry ;  by 
Music,  of  which  not  one  note  is  heard  in  Hell,  but 
which  rings  round  him  constantly  and  exquisitely  in  the 

Purgatory  and  the  Paradise  ;  above  all,  by  Nature  by 

the  serene  and  stainless  glory  of  the  sky,  by  the  pure- 
ness  of  the  dew,  and  by  the  glories  of  unequalled  dawn. 
Dante  had  felt,  as  it  would  be  well  for  all  of  us  to  feel, 
that  beauty  is  the  sacrament  of  goodness  ;  that  in  the 
sense  of  beauty,  satisfied  by  the  beauty  of  God's  works, 
we  see  and  we  recognize  the  very  autograph  of  God. 
And  this  beauty  is  reflected  in  the  graciousness  and 
goodness  of  all  God's  creatures.     The  men,  and  tlie 


320 


Dante. 


women,  and  the  fiends  of  the  abyss  are,  for  the  most 
part,  abhorrent  and  revolting  ;  while  the  demonic  creat- 
ures, Cerberus  and  the  Minotaur  and  Geryon,  are 
loathly  ;  and  the  fiends  of  the  Malebolge,  Malacoda, 
and  Cagnazzo,  and  Graffiacane,  and  Cirialto  are  as 
gross  and  as  infamous  as  imagination  can  conceive. 
Compare  these  with  the  fair,  white-winged  creatures 
with  faces  like  the  quivering  gleam  of  the  morning  star 
— falcons  and  swans  of  God — who  move  through  the 
"  Purgatorio."  Green  are  their  plumes,  green  as  the 
fresh-bom  leaflets  of  spring  ;  and  green — the  radiant 
color  of  hope — are  the  robes  fluttered  by  the  beating  of 
their  wings ;  and  their  fair,  golden  heads  are  visible, 
though  their  faces  dazzle  the  sight.  And  in  the  sixth 
circle,  the  Angel,  who  obliterates  one  more  fatal  letter 
from  Dante's  brow,  is  glorious  as  gold  in  the  furnace, 
and  the  touch  of  his  plumes  breathes  fragrance  like  the 
May  breeze  blown  over  grass  and  flowers  at  dawn,  and 
"sated  with  the  innumerable  rose." 

III.  I  shall  say  scarcely  anything  of  the  "Paradise." 
It  is  the  least  read  of  the  three  by  the  multitude,  and 
most  dear  of  the  three  to  the  real  student.  Whatever 
else  it  may  be,  it  is  emphatically  and  pre-eminently  the 
Poem  of  Light ;  of  Light,  lost  at  last  in  the  blinding 
intensity  of  that  central  lake  of  light  and  the  dazzling 
beatific  vision  of  Him  who  is  Light, 

"  And  never  but  in  unapproached  light 
Dwelt  from  Eternity  ;  dwelt  then  in  Thee, 
Bright  effluence  of  bright  essence  uncreate. 
Whose  fountain  who  shall  tell  ?  " 

If  you  would  understand  it — if  you  would  feel  its 
magic  influence,  you  must  bathe  yourselves  in  light ; 


Dante. 


321 


you  must  clothe  yourselves  in  light ;  you  must  walk  in 
light ;  you  must  gaze  on  light  with  the  eagle's  uudazzled 
eyes.  For  here  Dante  leaves  earth  behind  him.  He 
talks  with  no  meaner  beings  than  Virgins,  and  Saints, 
-and  Patriarchs,  and  Apostles.  He  talks  with  the  Em- 
peror Justinian  about  the  Koman  Empire ;  with  St. 
Thomas  and  St.  Bonaventura  about  the  Dominican  and 
Franciscan  orders  ;  with  his  crusading  and  knightly  an- 
cestor, Cacciaguida,  about  the  beautiful  simplicity  which 
contrasted  with  the  deepening  luxury  of  his  own  Flor- 
ence ;  with  St.  Benedict  about  monastic  corruption.  He 
sees  Adam  and  Solomon.  St.  Peter  questions  him 
about  Faith  ;  St.  James,  about  Hope  ;  St.  John,  about 
Love ;  and  the  happy  choirs  of  heaven  sink  into  as- 
tonished silence,  and  the  happy  lights  of  heaven  flicker 
into  fiery  indignation,  while  St.  Peter  fulminates  his 
more  than  Papal  a-nathema  against  the  blood-stained  and 
avaricious  pontiffs  who  on  earth  usurp  "  my  place,  my 
place,  my  place ; "  and  St.  Bernard  of  Clairvance, 
shows  him  the  queen  of  heaven  herself,  Mary,  "who  is 
the  centre  of  the  eternal  rose,"  with  Eve  sitting  at  her 
feet ;  and  at  last  he  is  suffered  to  gaze  in  vision  ineffable 
on  the  Supreme  Triune.  And  everywhere,  till  the  last, 
Beatrice  is  with  him,  and  in  her  eyes  are  the  demon- 
strations, and  in  her  smiles  the  persuasions  of  wisdom. 

And  everywhere  there  is  light  ;  in  every  circle  of  the 
planetary,  and  the  starry,  and  the  crystalline  heavens ; 
and  in  the  Empyrean,  and  in  the  mystical  White  Rose, 
and  in  the  Ladder  of  Gold,  whose  summit  is  invisible,  and 
in  the  Eiver  of  Life,  flaming  with  splendor,  between 
two  banks  bright  with  the  flowers  of  spring,  of  which 
be  drinks  ;  and  in  the  central  point  of  light  itself,  "  so 
21 


322 


Dante. 


intense  that  no  eye  can  gaze  on  it,  so  minute  that  the 
smallest  star  in  the  firmament  would  seem  a  moon 
beside  it."  The  vei'y  regions  through  which  he  passes 
are  like  eternal  pearls,  and  they  glide  through  them  aa 
rays  of  light  enter  into  the  water  without  disturbing  the 
unity  of  the  wave,  for  they  are  lucid  and  white  as  sun- 
struck  diamonds.  And  in  this  brimming  flood  of  light 
move  the  beatified  saints,  in  melody  and  glory,  more  ^ 
sweet  even  in  voice  than  brilliant  in  aspect,  circling 
round  Dante  in  vivid  garlands  of  eternal  roses,  or  swathed 
in  environments  of  ambient  radiance,  shooting  from  place 
to  place  like  fires  in  alabaster,  happy  fires,  living  topazes, 
living  rubies,  'flaming  in  ethereal  sunshine,  multitudes 
of  splendors  flitting  through  the  crystal  gleam  like 
birds.  And  even  after  these  unimaginable  "  varieties  of 
light,  and  combinations  of  stars,  and  rays,  and  jew- 
elled reflections,"  there  are  fresh  throngs  of  splendors — 
cressets,  and  crowns,  and  circles,  singing  round  the 
Virgin  in  ineffable,  indescribable  glories,  in  blinding 
and  bewildering  brilliances.  And  Paradise  itself  is  one 
great  white  rose,  and  its  yellow  centre  is  the  Central 
Light,  whose  circumference  would  outgird  the  sun  ; 
and  its  petals  upon  petals  are  innumerable  ranks  of 
spotless  spirits,  all  gazing  upon  the  Light  of  Light ;  and, 
as  bees  flit  among  the  flowers,  so  fluttering  about  the 
petals  of  the  Eternal  Rose,  "  tlieir  wings  of  gold,  their 
robes  white  as  snow,  their  face  radiant  as  pure  flame," 
enjoying  and  enjoyed,  the  multitude  of  the  Angels  de- 
posit in  the  recesses  of  those  happy  petals,  the  peace 
and  glow  brought  down  from  the  bosom  of  God.  And 
all  these  are  happy,  equally  happy,  for  though,  to  mor- 
tal apprehension,  they  seem  to  attain  a  lower  or  a 


Dante. 


323 


higher  sphere  in  the  circles  of  beatitude,  they  are  all 
and  equally  the  denizens  of  the  mystic  Rose,  because  the 
•will  of  each  and  all  is  exclusively  and  absolutely  the 
will  of  God,  so  that 

"  Each  spot  in  heaven 
Is  Paradise,  though  with  like  gracious  dew 
The  Supreme  Virtue  showers  not  over  ali." 

And  through  all  these  scenes  Dante  passes,  until  at 
last  he  is  suffered  to  gaze,  for  one  reason-annihilat- 
ing instant,  on  the  supernal  glory  of  the  Trinity  in 
Unity  ;  seeing,  as  in  one  lightning-flash,  which  melts 
his  memory  as  the  sunlight  melts  the  snow,  a  triple  orb 
of  three  different  colors,  of  which  the  one  seems  to  re- 
flect the  other,  and  the  third  is  like  fire  breathed  from 
both.  Here  thought  and  speech  fail  him  ;  but  hence- 
forth his  desire  and  will  are  as  a  wheel,  rolled  on  iu 
even  motion  by  the  same  love 

"  That  moves  the  sun  in  heaven,  and  all  the  stars." 

So  high  as  that  range  no  poetry  has  ever  reached ; 
higher  than  that  range  the  waxen  wings  of  poetry  are 
melted,  and  it  sinks  down  through  the  intense  inane. 

I  hasten  to  conclude.  Dante  lived  in  very  wild  days  ; 
not  in  a  smooth  silken  century  like  this,  when  so  many 
are  destitute  of  faith,  yet  terrified  by  scepticism.  You 
must  bear  this  in  mind.  He  lived  in  the  days  when  the 
Sicilian  Vespers  had  deluged  Palermo  with  massacre. 
He  had  heard,  as  a  young  man,  the  grim  tragedy  of 
Ugolino,  starved  to  death  with  his  sons  in  the  Tower  of 
Famine,  and  the  awful  murder  of  Paolo  and  Francesca 
by  her  husband  and  his  brother,  Giancotto.    He  had 


324 


Dante. 


seen  men  bnrnt  alire.  He  had  himself  been  sentenced 
to  be  burnt  alive  by  his  own  countrymen,  on  a  charge 
which  nobody  believed.  A  few  years  after  his  poem 
"was  written,  Fra  Dolcino  was  torn  to  pieces  with  hot 
pincers  in  the  public  market-place  at  Vercelli,  and  his 
follower,  the  rich  and  beautiful  Margarita,  consumed  at 
a  slow  fire  before  the  eyes  of  men.  Here  is  a  single  in- 
cident in  the  family  quarrel  of  the  Bianchi  and  Neri,  in 
the  course  of  which  his  fortunes  were  shipwrecked.  A  lad 
of  the  Neri  family  had,  in  a  quarrel,  struck  one  of  the 
Bianchi,  and  was  sent  by  his  father  to  apologize  to  the 
head  of  the  Bianchi.  This  chief  took  hold  of  the  boy 
then  and  there,  chopped  off  his  right  hand  on  a  dresser, 
and  sent  him  back  with  the  remark,  "Injuries  are  wiped 
out  by  blood  and  not  by  words." 

It  is  not  strange  that  such  terrible  times  had  terrible 
beliefs,  and  in  all  those  beliefs  Dante  shared.  Whatever 
Hell  may  be,  we  do  not  believe  that  it  is  like  the  Hell 
of  Dante,  a  burning  slaughter-house,  a  torture-chamber 
of  endless  vivisection  and  worse  than  inquisitorial 
horrors,  Avhere  souls  welter  in  the  crimson  ooze  of 
Phlesethon,  or  move  about  like  Nero-torches  of  ani- 
mated  flame.  Nevertheless,  under  that  dreadful  im- 
agery, so  weird,  lurid,  and  grotesque,  lie  truths  of 
eternal  import.  About  the  horror  and  infamies  of  a 
material  Hell,  about  the  steep  ascents  of  a  Purgatory, 
— if  such  there  be— about  the  glories  and  employ- 
inents  of  the  Paradise  of  God,  Dante  knew  just  as 
much,  which  is  just  as  little,  as  ourselves.  But  that 
there  is  a  moral  Hell  and  a  moral  Heaven  ;  that  Heaven 
and  Hell  are  tempers  and  not  only  places  ;  that  they 
are  states  of  the  soul,  and  not  physical  fires  or  golden 


Dante. 


325 


cities  in  the  far-off  blue,  he  knew,  as  all  must  know,  who 
have  enough  of  soul  left  in  them  undestroyed  by  vice  and 
worldliness  to  know  what  God  is,  and  to  feel  what  sin 
means.  Is  there  not  many  a  man  of  whom,  as  of 
Dante,  it  might  be  said,  "That  man  has  been  in  Hell  ?" 
Happy  the  man  who,  like  Dante,  has  struggled  through 
the  abyss  where  sin  is  punished,  to  the  mountain  where 
sin  is  purged,  to  the  Paradise  where  it  is  remembered  no 
more.  The  poem  was  not  written  to  give  mere  poetic 
pleasure,  but  to  teach  and  to  warn.  He  says  that  for 
many  years  it  made  him  lean.  "  The  seed  of  it  was 
sown  in  tears,  and  reaped  in  misery,"  and  it  was  in- 
tended to  describe  not  merely  or  chieHy,  an  obscene  Hell 
or  a  material  Heaven,  but  to  bring  home  to  us  the  truth 
that  this  world  is  the  next,  in  the  light  of  the  Eternal 
Yea  and  the  Eternal  Now. 
I  will  end  with  two  remarks. 

i.  One  is  his  sense  of  the  awful  transcendency  of 
goodness — the  sense  that  Good  and  Evil  are  "the  two 
polar  elements  of  this  creation,  on  which  it  all  turns," 
and  that  they  differ  "  not  by  preferability  of  one  to  the 
other,  but  by  incompatibility  absolute  and  in6nite  ;  that 
the  one  is  excellent  and  high  as  light  and  Heaven,  the 
other  hideous,  black  as  Gehenna  and  the  Pit  of  Hell."  If 
you  would  know  how  Sin  and  Holiness  appeared  to  one 
of  the  grandest  of  human  souls,  who  had  the  power 
also  to  clothe  his  symbols  in  the  intensest  imagery  ;  if 
you  would  be  lifted  from  that  base  condition  of  conven- 
tionality and  compromise  in  which  good  and  evil  are  not 
in  real  and  fierce  antagonism,  but  lie  flat  together,  side  by 
side,  in  immoral  acquiescence  and  infamous  neutrality ; 
then  you  may  learn  a  life-long  lesson  by  humble  study 


326 


Dante. 


of  the  "Divine  Comedy,"  which  strips  evil  bare  from  all 
its  masks  and  hypocrisies,  that  you  may  see  it  in  all  its 
naked  ghastliness,  and  which  shows  you  what  is  pure 
and  good  in  the  white  intensity,  the  seven-fold  perfec- 
tion of  undivided  light. 

ii.  Observe,  lastly,  that  Dante  writes  avowedly  with  a 
high  moral  pui-pose.  He  knows  nothing  of  the  prurient 
Tojan  talk  about  art  for  art's  sake,  still  less  of  its  nudi- 
ties, which  are  naked  and  not  ashamed.  He  reveals  to 
us,  in  the  poem,  step  by  stej),  his  own  moral  ameliora- 
tions. He  desires  to  make  his  readers  participate  in  the 
same  nobleness.  Man,  he  says,  in  his  prose  work  on 
"Monarchy"  (iii.  15),  stands  midway  betweeu  the  cor- 
ruptible and  the  incorruptible.  His  body  is  corrupti- 
ble ;  his  spirit  is  incorruptible.  Hence  his  destinies 
also  are  twofold,  so  far  as  he  is  corruptible,  and  so  far 
as  he  is  incorruptible.  God  has  set  before  him  two  ends 
— the  happiness  of  this  life  in  the  earthly  Paradise, 
which  may  be  attained  by  virtue,  and  the  happiness  of 
life  eternal,  which  consists  in  the  fruition  of  the  Divine 
countenance,  to  which  our  own  virtue  cannot  ascend 
unless  aided  by  the  Divine  light,  and  which  is  indicated 
by  the  celestial  paradise.  Human  knowledge  may  help 
us  to  attain  the  first ;  Divine  knowledge,  by  working  in 
us  faith,  hope  and  charity,  can  alone  help  us  to  attain 
the  second,  which  was  revealed  by  Jesus  Christ.  Hence 
the  object  of  Dante  was  to  hold  up  "before  men's 
awakened  and  captivated  minds  the  verity  of  God's 
moral  government ;  to  rouse  them  to  a  sense  of  the 
mystery  of  their  state ;  to  startle  their  commonplace 
notions  of  sin  into  an  imagination  of  its  variety,  its 
magnitude,  and  its  infinite  shapes  and  degrees ;  to  open 


Dante. 


327 


their  eyes  to  the  beauty  of  the  Christian  temper,  both 
as  sutfering  and  as  consummated ;  to  teach  them  at 
once  the  faithfulness  and  awful  f reeness  of  God's  grace;  to 
help  the  dull  and  lagging  soul  to  conceive  the  possibili- 
ties, in  its  own  case,  of  rising,  step  by  step,  in  joy  with- 
out an  end — of  a  felicity  not  unimaginable  by  man, 
though  of  another  order  from  the  highest  perfection  of 
earth ; — this  is  the  poet's  end."  His  subject,  as  he 
himself  explained  it,  is  not  so  much  the  state  of  souls 
after  death,  as  man — man  as  rendering  himself  liable, 
by  the  exercise  of  free  will,  by  good  or  ill  desert,  to  the 
rewards  or  punishment  of  justice.  It  is  solely  by  real- 
izing such  truths  that  men  can  obtain  the  ideal  charac- 
ter which  Dante  pictures  forth — the  picture  of  one 
who,  in  boyhood  is  gentle,  obedient,  modest ;  in  youth, 
temperate,  resolute  and  loyal ;  in  ripe  years,  prudent, 
just  and  generous ;  and  in  age  has  attained  to  calm 
wisdom  and  perfect  peace  in  God. 


LECTURE  II. 

Deliveeep  in  Boston,  Philadelphia,  and  New  York. 


f  aretuell  Ci^ougi^tjs  on  amenca* 


Among  the  commonest  questions  addressed  to  the 
Btranger  who  visits  your  hospitable  shores  are,  "What 
do  you  think  of  our  country  ?"  "What  do  you  think 
of  our  institutions  ?  "  The  frequency  of  the  questions 
proves,  I  suppose,  a  real  desire  to  know  the  general  im- 
pressions formed  by  those  from  the  old  home,  whom  you 
welcome  here.  Mny  one  who  has  been  received  among 
you  with  an  overflowing  kindness  far  beyond,  his  deserts, 
and  with  a  warmth  of  recognition  to  which  he  has  no 
claim ;  Avho,  though  a  stranger,  has  been  treated  as  a 
friend,  in  every  city  he  has  entered  ;  who  has  received 
words  of  cordial  welcome  and  appreciation  from  the 
members  of  every  religious  community  among  you, 
from  Eoman  Catholic  Archbishops  to  Shaker  Elders; 
who  has  spoken  at  nine  or  ten  of  your  Colleges  and 
Universities  ;  who  has  been  again  and  again  invited  to 
preach  in  your  Churches,  and  to  address  many  assem- 
blages of  the  clergy  or  of  theological  students ; — may 
such  a  stranger,  whom  you  have  encouraged  to  regard 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  329 


himself  as  a  friend,  endeavor  to  give,  or  perhaps  I  should 
rather  say,  to  indicate,  some  shadow  of  an  answer  to 
the  familiar  question  ? 

Such  an  answer  might  be  given — perhaps  has  been 
sometimes  given — in  a  tone  of  vanity  and  arrogance. 
Your  brilliant  representative,  Mr.  Lowell,  who,  in  spite 
of  the  fact  that  he  has  spoken  some  sharp  words  to  Eng- 
land and  the  English,  was  honored  and  beloved  in  Eng- 
land as  few  of  your  many  popular  Ministers  have  been, 
has  written  a  paper  on  "A  certain  condescension  in  For- 
eigners." The  humbleness  of  my  position,  the  small- 
ness  of  any  claims  of  mine  on  your  attention,  exempt 
me  from  all  temptations  to  vanity  and  arrogance.  Others 
again  have  offended  you  by  flattery,  and  others  have 
yexed  you  by  sarcasm  and  censure.  I  hope  that  I  shall 
not  be  so  unfortunate  as  to  fall  either  into  the  Scylla 
of  flattery — a  whirlpool  of  which  I  have  always  tried  to 
steer  clear — or  into  the  Charybdis  of  criticism,  which,  on 
my  part,  would  be  purely  presumptuous.  Thus  much, 
however,  I  may  say.  I  have  stood  in  simple  astonish- 
ment before  the  growth,  the  power,  the  irresistible 
advance,  the  Niagara-rush  of  sweeping  energy,  the 
magnificent  apparent  destiny  of  this  nation,  wonder- 
ing whereunto  it  would  grow.  I  have  been  touched 
by  the  large  generosity,  the  ungrudging  hospitality  of 
friends  in  America  whom  I  had  never  known  before.  I 
should  consider  myself  privileged  beyond  anything 
which  I  can  express,  if  any  poor  word  which  I  have 
been  asked  to  speak  in  America  might  prove  to  be  an 
influence  for  good  ;  if  it  could  be  one  more  link,  even 
microscopically  small,  in  the  golden  chain  of  mutual 
amity  which  now  happily  unites  the  two  nations  which 


330    Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 

yet  are,  and  ought  to  be  one  nation  ;  or  if  it  could  add 
anything  to  the  feeling  of  essential  unity  between  re- 
ligious bodies  which,  in  spite  of  their  differences,  have 
yet  one  great  end  in  view.  I  should  indeed  rejoice  if  I 
could  thus  repay  some  small  part  of  the  debt  of  my 
gratitude  and  contribute  my  infinitesimal  quota  to  the 
efforts  of  those  who — feeling  the  inherent  grandeur  of 
this  mighty  people,  and  impressed  with  the  eternal 
truth  that  righteousness  is  the  sole  palladium  of  the 
nations — are  devoting  heart  and  soul  to  the  purest 
effort  of  patriotism,  the  effort  which  shall  enable 
their  fellow-countrymen  to  rise  to  the  height  of  this 
great  argument,  and  by  their  means  to  elevate  the  moral 
condition  of  the  world.  And  why  should  this  hope  of 
mine  be  condemned  as  entirely  presumptuous  ?  Any- 
thing which  I  can  do  or  say  must  be  in  itself  of  trivial 
value  ;  but  still  it  may  serve  its  own  small  purpose  even 
as  it  is  the  despised  mica-flake  which  helps  to  build  the 
bases  of  the  mountain,  and  the  tiny  coral-insect  which 
lays  the  foundations  of  the  mighty  continent,  and  the 
grain  of  sand  which  is,  "  taken  up  by  the  wings  of  the 
wind,  to  be  a  barrier  against  the  raging  of  the  sea." 

Surely,  your  history,  so  brief  yet  so  memorable,  has 
been  too  plainly  marked  by  the  interpositions  of  God  to 
leave  any  American  unimpressed  by  the  responsibilities 
which  God  has  made  to  rest  upon  the  Atlantean  shoul- 
ders of  this  His  people.  There  are  some  who  are  fond 
of  looking  at  the  apparently  trifling  incidents  of  history, 
and  of  showing  how  the  stream  of  the  centuries  has  been 
diverted  in  one  or  other  direction  by  events  the  most 
insignificant.  General  Garfield  told  his  pupils  at  Hiram 
that  the  roof  of  a  certain  court-house  was  so  absolute  a 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  331 

water-shed  that  the  flutter  of  a  bird's  wing  would  be 
sufficient  to  decide  whether  a  particular  rain-drop 
should  make  its  way  into  the  Gulf  of  St.  Lawrence 
or  into  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  The  flutter  of  a  bird's 
wing  may  have  affected  all  history.  Some  students 
may  see  an  immeasurable  significance  in  the  flight  of 
parrots,  which  served  to  alter  the  course  of  Columbus, 
and  guided  him  to  the  discovery  of  North  and  not  of 
South  America.  There  is  no  need  for  us  to  touch  on 
such  curiosities.  Suffice  it  for  me  to  quote  a  testimony 
which  you  will  all  reverence — the  testimony  of  Wash- 
ington :  "When  I  contemplate,"  he  says,  in  his  letter 
to  the  governors  of  the  States,  in  1783,  "the  interposi- 
tion of  Providence,  as  it  was  visibly  manifest  in  guid- 
ing us  through  the  Eevolution  ...  I  feel  myself 
oppressed  and  almost  overwhelmed  with  a  sense  of 
Divine  munificence.  .  .  .  No  people  can  be  bound 
to  acknowledge  and  adore  an  Invisible  hand  which 
conducts  the  affairs  of  men  more  than  the  people  of 
the  United  States.  Every  step  by  which  they  have 
advanced  to  the  character  of  an  independent  nation 
seems  to  have  been  distinguished  by  some  token  of 
Providential  agency.  ...  Of  all  the  dispositions 
and  habits  which  lead  to  political  prosperity,  religion 
and  morality  are  indispensable  supports.  In  vain 
would  that  man  claim  the  tribute  of  patriotism  who 
should  labor  to  subvert  these  great  pillars  of  human 
happiness,  these  firmest  proofs  of  the  duties  of  men  and 
of  citizens."  So  wrote  Washington,  the  Father  of  his 
Country.  Such  was  his  conviction,  and  such  the  infer- 
ence to  which  it  led  him. 

In  truth,  this  lesson — the  Providence  of  God  in  the 


332     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 

affairs  of  nations — seems  to  be  stamped  upon  your  his- 
tory from  the  first.  When  Columbus  ceased  to  speak 
before  the  courtiers  at  Barcelona,  and  told  them  the 
discovery  of  the  Western  world, 

"  The  king  and  queen 
Sank  from  their  thrones  and  melted  into  tears, 
And  knelt,  and  lifted  hand  and  heart  and  voice 
In  praise  of  God  who  led  him  through  the  waste. 
And  then  the  great  '  Laudamus '  rose  to  heaven." 

When  William  Penn  founded,  among  the  forest  trees 
from  which  its  streets  are  yet  named,  the  City  of 
Brotherly  Love, — "It  is,"  he  said,  "a  holy  experi- 
ment, which  it  depends  upon  themselves  to  accom- 
plish or  ruin  ;  "  and  he  intended  Pennsylvania  to  be  an 
endeavor  "  to  improve  an  innocent  course  of  life  on  a 
virgin  Elysian  shore."  "Let  us,"  said  the  great  Edmund 
Burke — "let  us  auspicate  all  our  proceedings  in  Amer- 
ica with  the  old  Church  cry,  "  Sursum  corda."  George 
Herbert  wrote : 

"  Religion  stands  on  tiptoe  in  our  land, 
Ready  to  pass  to  the  American  strand." 

May  I  try  to  show  that  every  fact  of  your  early  his- 
tory emphasizes  the  religious  prophecies  which  thus  at- 
tended its  early  dawn  ? 

I.  Who  were  your  Fathers  ?  Look  to  the  rock  whence 
you  were  hewn,  and  the  hole  of  the  pit  whence  you 
were  digged.  The  stream  of  life  in  some  colonies  has 
been  tainted  by  the  blood  of  criminals.  Some  of  you 
may  have  read  Walter  Savage  Landor's  fine  address  to 
Mrs.  Chisholm : 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  333 

"  Chisholm  !  of  all  the  ages  that  have  rolled 
Around  this  rolling  world,  what  age  hath  seen 
Such  arduous,  such  heaven-guided  enterprise 
As  thine  ?   Crime  flies  before  thee,  and  the  shores 
Of  Australasia,  lustrated  by  thee, 
Collect  no  longer  the  putrescent  weed 
Of  Europe,  flung  by  senates  to  infect 
The  only  unpolluted  continent." 

But,  gentlemen,  the  line  you  draw  from  is  the  line  of 
men  brave  and  free,  and  the  blood  in  your  veins  is  the 
blood  of  heroes.  "A  Syrian  ready  to  perish  was  thy 
father,"  says  the  Hebrew  prophet  to  his  people.  A  few 
Englishmen  ready  to  perish  were  your  ancestors  ;  but 
they  were  true,  brave,  godfearing  men,  and  therefore 
the  irresistible  might  of  their  weakness  shook  the  world. 
Sicut  Patrihus,  sit  Deus  nobis  !  * 

There  were  Recusants  in  Maryland,  there  were  Cava- 
liers in  Virginia,  but  the  type  of  your  manhood  was  de- 
rived from  the  awful  virtue  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers.  If 
"the  feet  of  a  few  outcasts  pressed  Plymouth  Rock,  and 
it  became  famous,"  it  was  because  those  outcasts  were 
men  of  fixed  determination,  of  indomitable  courage,  of 
deep  faith,  of  earnest  prayer.  The  hundred  who  in  their 
frail  little  bark  braved  the  fury  of  the  elements,  were 
frowned  upon  alike  by  kings  and  priests,  but,  animated 
by  a  passion  for  Liberty,  they  carried  to  America,  as  Mr. 
Gladstone  has  said,  "all  that  was  Democratic  in  the 
policy  of  England,  and  all  that  was  Protestant  in  her 
religion."  Well  might  your  orator  exclaim,  "Victims 
of  persecution  !  how  wide  an  empire  acknowledges  the 
sway  of  your  principles !    Apostles  of  Liberty !  what 


*  The  motto  of  Boston. 


334     Farewell  Thoicghts  on  America. 


millions  attest  the  authenticity  of  your  mission."  But 
what  was  their  safeguard  ?  The  power  of  faith,  the 
passion  for  freedom.  "  We  do  verily  believe  and  trust," 
wrote  Robinson  and  Brewster  to  Sir  E.  Sandys,  in  1C17, 
"  that  the  Lord  is  with  us  unto  whom  and  whose  ser- 
vice we  have  given  ourselves  in  many  trials,  and  that 
He  will  graciously  prosper  our  endeavors  according  to 
the  simplicity  of  our  hearts." 

There  is  scarcely  a  man  whose  name  is  connected  with 
the  early  colonization  of  Nortii  America  that  is  not 
noble  and  memorable.  There  was  the  brilliant  and 
unhappy  Raleigh — brightest  star  in  the  galaxy  of  stars 
which  clustered  round  the  Virgin  Queen  who  gave  her 
name  to  Virginia.  There  was  Captain  John  Smith,  a 
man  with  the  soul  of  a  Crusader,  whose  favorite  book  was 
"Marcus  Aurelius,"  who  "in  all  his  proceedings  made 
justice  his  first  guide  and  experience  his  second,  com- 
bating baseness,  sloth,  pride,  and  iniquity  more  than  any 
other  dangers."  There  was  William  Penn,  ever  acting 
in  the  spirit  of  his  own  conviction  that  the  weak,  the  Just, 
the  pious,  the  devout  are  all  of  one  religion.  There  was 
Bradford,  the  stern  governor.  There  was  Oglethorpe, 
with  his  "strong  benevolence  of  soul."  There  was  the 
hero  of  the  Indian  wars.  Miles  Standish.  There  was  Roger 
Williams,  the  founder  of  Providence.  There  were  Win- 
throp  and  Endicott,  the  worthy  founders  of  worthy  lines. 

And  how  clearly  is  the  will  of  Heaven  marked  in 
your  history.  It  is  but  "God's  unseen  Providence" 
which  men  nickname  chance.  Least  of  all  nations  can 
America  prepare  a  table  for  chance  or  furnish  a  drink- 
offering  for  destiny.  * 


*  See  Isa.  Lxiv.  12. 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  335 

It  was  not  Chance  which  made  the  history  of  mankind 
hang  ou  the  fortunes  of  haudfuls  of  stragglers  in  the 
forests  of  Canada.  It  was  not  Chance  which  gave  the 
New  World  to  the  industry  of  Puritans,  the  individ- 
ualism of  busy  traders.  At  one  time,  as  Mr.  Parkman 
has  so  finely  shown,  it  seemed  certain  that  America 
would  have  become  the  appanage  of  France.  That 
would  have  meant  the  predominance  of  the  principles  of 
Richelieu  and  Loyola.  It  would  have  meant  the  sway 
of  the  despot,  the  noble,  and  the  Jesuit  in  the  continent 
of  freedom.  "  Populations  formed  iu  the  habits  of  a 
feudal  monarchy  and  controlled  by  a  hierarchy  pro- 
foundly hostile  to  liberty  would  have  been  a  hindrance 
and  a  stumbling-block  in  the  way  of  that  majestic  ex- 
periment of  which  America  is  the  field."  But  the  hopes 
of  the  Jesuits,  in  spite  of  all  their  noble  labors  and 
heroic  martyrdoms,  were,  in  the  Providence  of  God,  shat- 
tered to  pieces  by  the  fierce  tomahawks  of  the  Iroquois. 
The  gigantic  ambition  of  France  was  foiled  by  the  "  lit- 
tle, sickly,  red-haired  hero  "  at  Quebec  ;  and  the  weak 
and  broken  line  of  English  colonies  along  the  shores  of 
the  Atlantic,  the  descendants  of  an  oppressed  and  fugi- 
tive people,  dashed  down  the  iron  hand  of  monarchy  in 
the  flush  of  its  triumphant  power. 

At  another  time  it  seemed  as  if  the  New  World  were 
to  belong  to  the  proud,  sickly  blood  of  decaying  Spain. 
St.  Augustine,  in  Florida,  founded  in  1565,  was  the 
first  town  built  by  whites  in  the  United  States.  That 
would  have  meant  the  horrible  despotism  of  Alvas 
and  Philips  ;  it  would  have  meant  the  narrow  and  crush- 
ing tyranny  of  the  bigot  and  the  monk  ;  it  would  have 
meant  the  Mass-book,  the  thumb-screw,  and  the  blood- 


33^    Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 


hound  ;  it  would  have  meant  the  inert  and  execrable 
rule  of  men  like  Menendez,  the  outcome  of  an  infernal 
ignorance  animated  by  an  infernal  religious  zeal.  But 
Spain  was  foiled  by  De  Gourges,  who  justly  hanged,  **  not 
as  Spaniards,  but  as  traitors,  robbers,  and  murderers," 
the  Spaniards  who  had  hanged  Huguenots,  "not  as 
Frenchmen,  but  as  Lutherans  ;  " — and  again  by  General 
Oglethorpe,  who  with  eight  hundred  men  attacked  and 
drove  from  Frederica  their  fleet  with  five  thousand  men 
on  board. 

And  so  it  has  been  written  in  God's  Book  of 
Destiny  that  over  America  should  wave  neither  the 
golden  lilies  of  France,  nor  the  lion  and  tower,  "pale 
emblems  of  Castilian  pride ; "  but  first  the  stainless 
semper  eadem  of  England,  and  then — we  do  not  grudge 
them  to  you — the  stars  and  stripes  which  you  borrowed 
from  the  English  tomb  of  the  Washingtons. 

America  was  God's  destined  heritage,  not  for  tyranny, 
not  for  aristocracy,  not  for  privilege — not  for  Spanish 
bigotry  or  French  ambition — but  for  England,  and  for 
the  Eeformation,  and  for  progress,  and  for  liberty,  and  for 
the  development — if  you  fall  not  short  of  the  vast  obliga- 
tions which  rest  upon  you — of  a  great  and  noble  type  of 
righteous,  fearless,  and  independent  manhood. 

II.  The  voices  of  prophetic  insight,  from  Seneca  down- 
ward, point  to  such  a  destiny. 

Alluding  to  King  James  and  the  foundation  of  James- 
town, Shakespeare,  in  the  prophecy  which  he  puts  into 
the  mouth  of  Oranraer,  says: 

"  His  honor  and  the  greatness  of  his  name 
Shall  make  new  nations." 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  337 


"  "Westward,"  wrote  Bishop  Berkeley  in  the  four  mem- 
orable lines,  now  engraved  over  the  portal  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  San  Francisco — 

"  Westward  the  course  of  empire  takes  its  way, 
The  first  four  acts  already  past, 
The  fifth  shall  close  the  drama  with  the  day, 
Time's  noblest  offspring  is  the  last." 

Those  lines  seem  to  have  been  written  in  a  flash  of 
prophetic  insight ;  and  years  later  Emerson  wrote  : 

"  Lo!  I  uncover  the  land, 

Which  I  hid  of  old  time  in  the  West, 
As  the  sculptor  uncovers  his  statue, 
When  he  has  wrought  his  best." 

But  it  is  for  America,  not  to  repeat  these  prophecies 
with  complacency,  but  rather  to  register  in  heaven  the 
vow  that  they  shall  be  fulfilled.  When  the  sword  of 
Cornwallis  was  surrendered  to  Washington  at  Yorktown, 
some  of  the  Americans,  with  a  want  of  consideration 
which  at  such  a  moment  was  perhaps  venial,  began  to 
cheer.  But,  turning  to  them,  the  noble  Virginian  said, 
with  a  fine  rebuke,  "Let  posterity  cheer  for  us."  Gen- 
tlemen, you,  as  the  youngest  of  the  nations,  may  put 
your  sickle  into  the  ripened  harvest  of  the  world's 
experience,  and  if  you  loam  the  lessons  which  that  rev- 
elation has  to  teach,  Posterity  will  raise  for  you  such  a 
cheer  as  shall  ring  through  all  the  ages.  But  the  les- 
sons of  History  are  full  of  warning.  "  I  will  overturn, 
overturn,  overturn,"  saith  the  Lord,  "till  he  come 
whose  right  it  is."  When  the  representatives  of  many 
nations  met  Alexander  at  Babylon,  the  Eoman  ambas- 
sadors were,  it  is  said,  the  obscurest  among  them  ;  yet 

Greece  was  overturned,  and  Eome  snatched  the  sceptre 
22 


33^     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 


from  her  palsying  hands.  Babylon,  Assyria,  Carthage, 
Greece,  Eome,  have  passed  away.  "  Since  the  first  domin- 
ion of  men  was  asserted  over  the  ocean,"  says  Mr.  Bus- 
kin, "  three  empires,  of  mark  beyond  all  others,  have 
been  set  upon  its  sands  :  the  thrones  of  Tyre,  of  Venice, 
of  England.  Of  the  First  of  these  great  powers  only 
the  memory  remains ;  of  the  Second,  the  ruin ;  the 
Third,  which  inherits  their  greatness,  if  it  forget  their 
example,  may  be  led  through  prouder  eminence  to  less 
pitied  destruction." — Is  not  the  warning  thus  given  to 
England  as  needful  for  the  United  States  ? 

III.  I  have  touched  on  your  Fathers,  but  yet  another 
mighty  impulse  for  good  comes  to  you  from  the  early 
Visitors  to  your  shores.  With  what  interest  do  we  remem- 
ber Kobert  Hunt,  Vicar  of  Reculver,  in  Kent,  who  on  June 
21, 1607,  celebrated  the  first  English  communion  ever  held 
in  the  New  World  with  the  unruly  crew  of  Captain  John 
Smith.  Was  it  no  boon  to  you  that  Charles  Wesley,  the 
sweet  poet  of  the  Methodist  movement,  was  the  secretary 
of  General  Oglethorpe,  and  accompanied  him  to  Georgia 
with  his  brother  John  Wesley  ?  In  St.  Simon's  Island 
yon  can  still  point  to  Wesley's  oak,  and  in  Newbury- 
port  Church  to  the  grave  of  George  Whitefield.  It  was  he 
who  suggested  the  motto.  Nil  desperandum  Cliristo  duce, 

"  That  day  when  sunburned  Pepperell, 
His  shotted  salvoes  fired  so  well ; 
The  Fleur  de  Lys  trailed  sulky  down. 
And  Louisburg  was  George's  town." 

Thus  to  you  also  was  communicated,  by  strange  inter- 
positions of  Providence,  the  electric  thrill  of  that 
awakenment  which  startled  the  eighteenth  century  from 
its  torpor  of  indolence  and  death. 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  339 

Besides  these,  there  came  to  you  two  great  visitors  of 
whose  interest  and  affection  any  country  might  be  proud. 
One  was  the  gallant,  the  ciiivalrous,  tlie  stainless  Lafa- 
yette, burning  with  the  passion  for  freedom  and  the  en- 
thusiasm of  humanity;  the  other  was  that  whitest  of 
human  souls.  Bishop  Berkeley,  M'hose  wooden  house  still 
stands  at  Newport.  It  is  something  that  you  can  point 
to  the  sea-cave  in  which  was  written  the  "Minute  Philos- 
opher;" something  that  the  early  streams  of  your  history 
are  commingled  with  the  purest  glories  of  the  French 
Revolution,  and  the  serene  dawn  of  modern  Philosophy  ; 
with  the  influence  of  one  who  added  to  the  holiness  of 
a  saint  the  keenness  of  a  philosopher,  and  to  whom  one 
of  the  most  cynical  of  })oets  could  ascribe  "every  virtue 
under  heaven."  Lafayette  hung  the  key  of  the  Bastile 
in  Mount  Vernon  ;  Berkeley  left  his  library  to  Yale. 

Then,  still  keeping  to  the  earlier  stages  of  American 
history,  how  distinctive  and  how  beautiful  are  the  char- 
acteristics of  your  great  men  in  Church  and  State  : — In 
the  Church,  or,  if  you  prefer  it,  in  the  churches — but 
to  me  there  is  but  one  great  flock  of  God,  however 
many  may  be  the  folds — you  may  look  back  with  pride 
to  the  holy  enthusiasm  and  boundless  self-sacrifice  of 
David  Brainerd ;  to  the  lion-hearted  courage  of  John 
Eliot ;  to  those  four  students  at  "Williamstown  who 
gave  the  first  impulse  to  the  mighty  work  of  missions  ; 
to  the  heroic  endurance  of  Adoniram  Judson  ;  to  John- 
son of  Yale,  who  in  1717  was  the  first  to  teach  the  Co- 
pernican  system  in  America  ;  to  the  faith  and  deter- 
mination of  Bishop  Seabury ;  to  the  large-hearted  the- 
ology and  far-seeing  wisdom  of  Bishop  White ;  to  the 
intense  if  Cimmerian  theology  of  Jonathan  Edwards ; 


340     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 

to  the  fiery  courage  of  Theodore  Parker  ;  to  the  conquer- 
ing sweetness  and  charity  of  William  Ellery  Channing, 
"whose  word  went  forth  like  morning  over  the  Conti- 
nents." In  the  State,  time  would  fail  me  to  tell  of  Jef- 
ferson, who  wrote  your  immortal  Declaration  of  Inde- 
pendence ;  of  Otis,  with  his  tongue  of  flame,  who 
"breathed  into  your  nation  the  breath  of  life;"  of 
Patrick  Henry,  that 

"  Forest-bom  Demosthenes, 
Whose  thunder  shook  the  Philip  of  the  Seas ; " 

of  young  Warren,  with  his  death  and  glory.  Yes,  in 
your  old  South  Church,  which  I  trust  you  will  preserve 
inviolate  forever, 

"Adams  shall  look  in  Otis'  face, 

Blazing  with  freedom's  soul, 
And  Molyneux  see  Hancock  trace 
The  fatal  word  which  frees  a  race  ; 
There  in  New  England's  well-earned  place, 

The  head  of  Freedom's  roll  1 " 

And  two  there  are  who  must  have  separate  and 
special  mention.  One  was  the  true  patriot  and  sage, 
who 

Called  the  red  lightning  from  the  o'er-rushing  cloud, 
And  dashed  the  beauteous  terror  on  the  ground. 
Smiling  majestic  ; " 

the  other,  he  who,  "first  in  war,  first  in  peace,  first  in  the 
hearts  of  his  countrymen,"  has  been  called  by  an  Eng- 
lish writer  "  the  greatest  of  good  men,  and  the  best  of 
great  men,"  and  of  whom  your  own  great  orator  has  said 
that  "America  has  furnished  to  the  world  the  character 
of  Washington." 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  341 

"  So  sacred!  is  there  aught  surrounding 
Our  lives,  like  that  great  Past  behind, 
Where  Courage,  Freedom,  Faith  abounding, 
One  mighty  cord  of  honor  twined?" 

IV.  Let  me  pass  on  to  the  War  of  Independence,  and 
I  am  certain  that  every  one  here  will  agree  with  me  when 
I  say  that  Americans  in  the  last  few  years  have  begun 
to  understand  far  better  the  feelings  of  Englishmen  re- 
specting it.  In  reading  some  of  the  Fourth  of  July 
utterances  we  might  fancy  that  you  believed  us  to  enter- 
tain a  sore  and  sullen  feeling,  and  that  no  Englishman 
could  think  without  a  blush  of  shame  and  a  spasm  of 
anger  of  the  surrender  of  Burgoyne  at  Saratoga  and  of 
Cornwallis  at  Yorktown.  I  hope  that  I  need  not  in  the 
year  1885  stop  to  remove  so  unfounded  an  impression. 
I  have  myself  preached  a  Fourth  of  July  sermon  in 
Westminster  Abbey,  and  have  invited  your  eminent 
countryman.  Dr.  Phillips  Brooks,  to  do  the  same. 
Strange  that  any  American  should  overlook  the  fact 
that  the  opponents  of  the  American  colonies  were  not 
the  English  people,  but  the  king  and  the  rulers  who 
misrepresented  them.  Have  you  forgotten  the  words 
of  Burke  ?  Have  you  forgotten  that  Barre  called  you 
"Sons  of  Liberty?"  Have  you  forgotten  his  daring 
words  in  the  House  of  Commons,  once  familiar  to  your 
very  school-boys  ? — "  They  planted  by  your  care  I  No  ! 
Your  oppression  planted  them  in  America.  .  .  .  They 
nourished  by  your  indulgence  !  They  grew  up  by  your 
neglect  of  them.  They  protected  by  your  arms  !  They 
have  nobly  taken  up  arms  in  your  defence  !  "  Can  you 
ever  forget  the  volcanic  outburst  of  Chatham  ? — "  The 
gentleman  tells  us  that  America  is  obstinate,  America  is 


342     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 

almost  in  open  rebellion.  Sir,  I  rejoice  that  America 
has  resisted  !  Three  millions  of  people  so  dead  to  all 
the  feelings  of  liberty  as  voluntarily  to  submit  to  be 
slaves,  would  have  been  fit  instruments  to  make  slaves  of 
all  the  rest."  If  our  glories  are  yours,  we  have  learned 
also  to  look  on  yours  as  ours.  We  do  not  grudge  you 
your  Marathon  of  Bunker  Hill,  and  we  can  repeat  as 
proudly  as  you — 

"  By  the  rude  bridge  that  arched  the  flood 
Their  flag  to  April's  breeze  unfurled ; 
la  arms  the  embattled  farmers  stood, 

And  fired  the  shot  heard  round  the  world." 

And  I  will  tell  you  why  we  can  look  to  the  defeat  of 
our  forces  without  any  of  that  shame  which  we  should 
have  felt  had  the  defeat  come  from  any  hands  but  yours. 
It  is  because  England  could  say,  almost  with  a  smile, 
My  sons  have  conquered  ;  it  is  from  me  they  drew  their 
strength!  When  the  lioness  was  taunted  with  bringing 
forth  only  one  cub  at  a  time,  she  answered  :  "  Yes,  but 
that  is  a  lion."  You  fought  us  in  our  own  spirit.  You 
retaught  us  what  you  had  learned  from  us  ;  your  rebel- 
lion was  but  a  vibration  of  "  that  deep  chord  which  Hamp- 
den smote."  When  American  friends  gave  me  a  window 
in  honor  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  the  founder  of  Virginia, 
the  Father  of  the  United  States,  I  asked  Mr.  Lowell  to 
write  the  inscription,  and  he  wrote  this  quatrain  : 

"  The  New  World's  sons,  from  England's  breast  we  drew 
Such  milk  as  bids  remember  whence  we  came ; 
Proud  of  her  Past,  from  which  our  Present  grew, 
This  window  we  erect  to  Raleigh's  name." 


Keep  your  Fourth  of  July  celebrations  as  long  as  you 


Farewell  Thotights  on  America.  343 


will.  Let  them  teach  you  to  say,  with  good  reason, 
"Thank  God,  I  also  am  an  American."  But  I  am  sure 
that  thoy  will  be  kept  no  longer  in  any  spirit  of  hostility 
to  your  mother-land.  An  Arab  in  the  desei't  once  asked 
a  traveller  if  he  was  an  Englishman.  "  No,"  was  the 
answer,  "I  am  an  American."  The  Arab's  only  reply 
was  to  hold  out  two  of  his  fingers.  He  had  never  heard 
Fluellen's  proverb,  "  As  like  as  my  fingers  to  my  fingers," 
but  he  knew  that  England  and  America  are  one  in  lan- 
guage, one  in  manner,  one  in  desires  and  habits  and  as- 
pirations, one  in  worship  and  birth  and  blood. 

In  the  issue,  then,  of  your  War  of  Independence,  we 
too  see  the  hand  of  God.  Franklin,  in  1783,  mentions 
the  daily  prayer  offered  up  for  the  Divine  protection. 
*'Our  prayers,"  he  says,  "were  heard,  and  they  were 
graciously  answered.  All  of  us  who  were  engaged  in 
the  struggle  must  have  observed  frequent  instances  of  a 
superintending  Providence  in  our  favor.  Have  we  for- 
gotten that  Divine  Friend,  or  do  we  no  longer  need  His 
assistance  ?  I  have  lived,  sir,  a  long  time,  and  the 
longer  1  live  the  more  convincing  proofs  I  see  of  the 
truth  that  God  governs  in  the  affairs  of  men."  Perhaps 
Franklin  was  thinking  of  the  sudden  tempest  Avhich 
came  in  answer  to  Thomas  Prince's  prayer,  when,  in  1746, 
Admiral  D'Anville  had  sworn  to  ravage  Boston  Town. 

V.  I  pass  on  to  the  great  crisis  of  your  modern  history 
— the  war  of  secession,  the  civil  war,  the  war  between  the 
North  and  the  South.  In  that  war,  too,  in  its  origin, 
in  its  issues,  in  its  many  incidents,  I  see  as  manifestly 
as  in  your  origin,  and  in  the  War  of  Independence  the 
light  of  God,  which  shines  on  so  steadily,  and  shows  all 
things  in  the  slow  history  of  their  ripening. 


344    Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 

What  an  awful  time  it  was,  and  how  you  learned  to 
realize,  as  we  had  realized  two  centuries  and  a  half 
before  you,  the  horrors  of  a  house  divided  against  itself  ! 
Civil  war  is  at  the  best  a  heart-rending  word,  and  if  the 
younger  generation  fail  to  realize  all  it  meant,  we  can  feel 
what  it  meant — we  who  have  lived  through  the  Indian 
mutiny  and  the  Crimeau  war.  We  know  how  your 
hearts  ached  to  think  of  those  whom  God  touched  with 
His  finger  in  the  woods  of  Tennessee  and  by  the  green 
hill-slopes  of  the  Potomac  ;  of  that  disaster  at  Bull  Run, 
where  your  new  volunteers  were  faint  with  thirst  and 
hunger,  and  fell  asleep  on  the  greensward  for  very  weari- 
ness; of  Washington  turned  into  one  great  hospital ; 
of  those  multitudes  of  terrible  oblong  boxes  which  the 
trains  carried  to  various  cities  ;  of  the  tears  of  the  nation 
which  fell  so  hot  and  heavy  over  her  dead  volunteers. 
You  can  never  forget,  while  life  lasts,  the  days  when,  as 
the  eye  glanced  over  the  daily  papers,  the  two  words, 
"  mortally  wounded,"  struck  an  unutterable  chill  into 
so  many  hearts  of  mothers  and  wives  ;  when  men,  sacri- 
ficing all,  locked  the  shops  and  chalked  up,  "  We  have 
enlisted  for  the  war;"  when  those  brave  hearts  went 
down  in  the  stream  on  board  the  Cumberland,  sloop  of 
war  ;  when  the  red  stains  on  the  woodland  leaves  were 
not  only  from  the  maple's  conflagration ;  when  your 
land,  even  amid  her  anguish,  rejoiced  that  she  had  sons 
with  hearts  like  these.  In  those  days  God  ordained  for 
you  famine  and  fire  and  sword  and  lamentation.  The 
blood  of  the  gallant  and  good  flowed  like  a  river,  and 
the  dear  ones  at  home  hungered  for  news ;  and  dread 
memories  were  left  for  years,  and  the  hearts  of  women 
slowly  broke.    It  was  not  only  gray-haired  fathers 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  345 


who  sank  under  the  bayonet  thrust,  and  men  who 
came  home  crippled  for  the  rest  of  life,  but  the  shots 
which  pierced  the  breasts  of  young  men  drenched  in 
blood  a  picture  and  a  lock  of  woman's  hair  ;  and  in  the 
"  delirious  fever  of  their  wounds  bright-eyed,  gallant 
boys  talked  of  their  mothers  and  babbled  of  the  green 
fields  at  home.  How  full  is  that  page  in  your  history 
of  noble  and  tender  memories  !  "  In  how  many  paths," 
said  Mr.  Lowell,  "  leading  to  how  many  homes,  where 
proud  memory  does  all  she  can  to  fill  up  the  fire- 
side gaps  with  shining  shapes,  do  men  walk  in  pensive 
mood  ?  Ah,  young  heroes,  safe  in  immortal  youth  as 
those  of  Homer,  you  at  least  carried  your  ideal  hence 
untarnished.  It  is  locked  for  you,  beyond  moth  and 
rust,  in  the  treasure-chamber  of  death."  Your  poets, 
even  your  unknown  poets,  spoke  of  it  in  touching 
accents : 

"  A]I  quiet  along  the  Potomac  to-night, 
Except  now  and  then  a  stray  picket 
Is  shot,  as  he  walked  on  the  beat  to  and  fro, 

By  a  rifleman  hid  in  the  thicket. 
'Tis  nothing — a  private  or  two  now  and  then 

Will  not  count  in  the  news  of  the  battle; 
Not  an  oflBcer  lost— only  one  of  the  men 
Moaning  out,  all  alone,  the  death-rattle. 
*  *  *  * 

"He  passes  the  fountain,  the  blasted  pine-tree, 

His  footstep  is  lagging  and  weary, 
Yet  onward  he  goes  through  the  broad  belt  of  light. 

Though  the  shades  of  the  forest  be  dreary. 
Hark!  was  it  the  night-wind  that  rustled  the  leaves  ? 

Was  it  moonlight  so  wondrously  flashing  ? 
It  looked  like  a  rifle — '  Ha!  Mary,  good-night! ' 

And  the  life-blood  is  ebbing  and  plashing. 


34^     Farewell  Thoughts  07i  America. 


"All  quiet  along  the  Potomac  to-night, 
No  sound  save  the  rush  of  the  river, 
While  soft  falls  the  dew  on  the  face  of  the  dead  ; — 
The  picket's  off  duty  forever." 

Men  left  at  home  their  pale  young  wives  and  sweet 
groups  of  little  children,  and  how  many  thought — 

"  You  have  put  the  children  to  bed,  Alice, 
Maud  and  Willie  and  Rose; 
They  have  lisped  their  sweet  Our  Father, 

And  sunk  to  their  night's  repose. 
Did  they  think  of  me,  dear  Alice, 
Did  they  think  of  me,  and  say, 
'  God  bless  him,'  and  '  God  bless  him, 
Dear  father  far  away  ? '  " 

And  then,  what  indomitable  determination  was 
breathed  forth  by  some  of  your  songs  : 

"  For  the  birthright  yet  unsold, 
For  the  history  yet  imtold, 
For  the  future  yet  unrolled — 
Put  it  through! 

"Father  Abram,  hear  us  cry— 
We  can  follow,  we  can  die; 
Lead  your  children,  then,  and  try — 
Put  it  through  I 

"  Here's  a  work  of  God  half  done. 
Here's  the  kingdom  of  His  Son, 
With  its  triumph  just  begun — 
Put  it  through! 

"Father  Abram,  that  man  thrives 
■VMio  with  every  weapon  strives. 
Use  our  twenty  million  lives — 
Put  it  through ! 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  347 


"  'Tis  to  you  the  trust  is  given, 
'Tis  by  you  the  bolt  is  driven. 
By  the  very  God  of  Heavei, 
Put  it  through!" 

Yes,  those  sad  days  had  their  nobleness  and  their 
deep,  unbroken  human  affections  amid  the  horrors  of 
war.  Bad  practices  and  fierce  factions  were  forgotten. 
You  remember  how  when  two  regimental  bands  were 
hurling  responsive  and  defiant  strains  at  each  other,  at 
last  one  of  them  struck  up  "Home!  Sweet  Home!" 
and  to  that  challenge  the  enemy  had  no  defiance  ;  all  they 
could  do  was  to  join  their  strains  also  with  the  strains 
of  their  foemen  in    Home  !  Sweet  Home  !  "  So  does 

"  One  touch  of  nature  make  the  whole  world  kin." 

You  remember  how  when  General  Lee  lay  sleeping 
under  a  tree  for  weariness,  the  army  of  the  South 
marched  by  him  in  utter  silence,  liaving  passed  along 
the  lines  the  whisper,  "  Uncle  Robert's  asleep  ;  don't 
disturb  him."  You  remember  how  once  the  two  hostile 
armies  delayed  the  charge  and  stopped  firing  because  a 
little  child  had  strayed  between  the  lines.  In  that  war, 
too,  I  see  distinctly 

"  God's  terrible  and  fiery  finger 
Shrivel  the  falsehood  from  the  souls  of  men." 

You  had  bitter  feelings  against  England  because  of  the 
Alabama,  and  because  you  thought  she  sympathized  with 
the  South  more  than  the  North.  Well,  in  the  first  place, 
the  great  heart  of  England  was  in  no  sense  whatever 
responsible  for  the  muddle  of  international  law  which  al- 
lowed the  escape  of  the  Alabama,  and,  in  the  second  place, 
even  for  her  voluntary  entanglement  in  the  doings  of  that 


34^     Farewell  Thoughts  07i  America. 


vessel,  though  they  were  done  against  her  will,  England 
has  made  you  frank  acknowledgment  and  has  paid  you 
ample  reparation.  Nor  was  it  true  that  the  voice  which 
John  Bright  raised  for  you  in  Birmingham  was  a  voice 
without  an  eclio.  It  woke  hundreds  and  thousands  of 
echoes  ;  only,  you  must  remember  that  iu  those  days,  if 
many  of  us  by  no  means  understood  the  issue,  neither  did 
many  of  you.  God  has  flashed  the  light  of  history  over 
the  obscurities  of  those  days,  and  made  many  things 
plain  which  then  were  complex.  It  was  He  who  gave 
you  grace  as  a  nation  to  decide  aright ;  for 

"  Once  to  every  man  and  nation  comes  the  moment  to  decide. 
In  the  strife  of  truth  and  falsehood  for  the  good  or  evil  side. 
Some  great  cause,  God's  new  Messiah,  ofEering  each  the  bloom 
or  blight, 

Parts  the  goats  upon  the  left  hand,  and  the  sheep  upon  the  right; 
And  the  choice  goes  by  forever  'twixt  the  darkness  and  the  light." 

In  that  hour  America  had  the  wisdom  given  her  to  de- 
cide— 

"  In  whose  party  she  should  stand. 
Ere  the  Doom  from  its  worn  sandals  shook  the  dust  against  her 
land." 

And  God  gave  you  the  right  men  to  guide  you.  He 
gave  you  that  strong,  homely,  wise,  fearless  type  of 
American  manhood,  Abraham  Lincoln,  calling  him  as 
clearly  from  the  wood-shanty  and  the  store  as  ever  he 
called  David  from  following  the  ewes  great  with  young 
ones.  From  the  leather-store  at  Galena,  He  called  your 
indomitable  soldier.  Grant,  with  his  clear-sighted  pur- 
pose and  his  demands  of  ''unconditional  surrender." 
From  the  log-hut  and  the  school -master's  desk  He 
called  the  firm  spirit  of  James  Garfield.    The  shot  of 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  349 


the  assassin  cut  short  their  martyr-lives,  but  not  until 
their  work  was  done  ;  and  "  when  God's  servants  have 
done  their  day's  work  He  sends  them  sleep."  Each  of 
them  has  sunk  to  sleep  amid  your  tears.  "  For  de- 
parted kings  there  are  appointed  honors,  and  the 
wealthy  have  their  gorgeous  obsequies;  it  was  their 
nobler  function  to  clothe  a  nation  in  spontaneous 
mourning,  and  to  go  down  to  the  grave  amid  the 
benedictions  of  the  poor." 

Your  civil  war  ended,  and  ended  gloriously.  The 
South  accepted  the  terrible  arbitrament  and  read  God's 
will  in  its  issue,  and  bowed  her  head  and  clasped  your 
hand  in  fraternal  union.  The  bow  of  peace  spanned 
once  more  the  stormy  heaven,  and  the  flag  which  had 
been  rent  was  one  again,  and  without  a  seam. 

"  Then  hail  the  banner  of  the  free, 
The  starry  flower  of  liberty ; 
Behold,  its  streaming  rays  unite 
Mingling  floods  of  braided  light — 
The  red  that  fires  the  Southern  rose 
With  spotless  white  from  Northern  snows, 
And  spangled  o'er  its  azure  sea 
The  sister  stars  of  Liberty." 

Thenceforth  the  question  of  slavery  is  settled  on  the 
right  side  forever— the  life-long  effort  of  Channing,  and 
Theodore  Parker,  and  Whittier,  and  Lloyd  Garrison, 
and  Wendell  Phillips,  and  all  the  glorious  army  of 
Abolitionists  was  accomplished,  and  you  will  remain, 
we  trust, 

"  One  flag,  one  land,  one  heart,  one  hand, 
One  Nation  evermore," 

while  your  genius  of  Liberty  holds  forth  her  olive-branch 


350    Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 

and  tramples  the  broken  fetters  of  four  million  slaves 
beneath  her  feet. 

VI.  And  then  at  once  and  most  gladly,  and,  let  us 
hope,  for  many  a  century,  you  laid  the  sword  aside. 
"The  sword,  after  all,"  as  Victor  Hugo  says,  "is  but 
a  hideous  flash  in  the  darkness,"  while  "Eight  is  an 
eternal  ray."  "As  the  sword,"  said  Washington,  "  was 
the  last  resort  for  the  perservation  of  our  liberties,  so  it 
ought  to  be  the  first  they  lay  aside  when  those  liberties 
are  firmly  established."  When  the  Duke  of  Cambridge 
asked  General  Grant  to  review  the  English  army,  he 
made  the  noble  answer  that  a  military  review  was  the 
one  thing  which  he  hoped  never  to  see  again.  But 
the  War  of  the  Secession  established  your  national 
position.  Just  as,  during  the  fighting,  many  a  boy, 
learning  to  look  death  in  the  face,  sj^rang  into  manhood 
at  the  touch  of  noble  responsibility,  so  the  war  strength- 
ened and  sobered  you,  and  gave  to  your  thoughts,  your 
politics,  your  bearing  as  a  people,  a  grander  and  manlier 
tone.  The  nation  waved  her  hand,  and  her  army  of 
more  than  a  million  sank  back  instantly  into  peaceful 
civil  life,  as  the  soldiers  of  Eoderic  Dhu  sank  i)ack 
into  the  heather.  "  Cincinnatus,"  says  Mr.  Gladstone, 
*' became  a  commonplace  example.  .  .  .  The  gen- 
erals of  yesterday  were  the  editors,  the  secretaries,  and 
the  solicitors  of  to-day. "  It  was  a  noble  lesson  to  man- 
kind, and  a  splendid  service  to  the  cause  of  popular 
government  throughout  the  world.  And  again  I  say 
that  the  man  must  be  blind  indeed  who  cannot  see  that 
God's  manifest  Providence  led  and  protected  you.  "If 
a  sparrow  cannot  fall  to  the  ground  without  God's  no- 
tice, is  it  probable  that  an  empire  can  rise  without  His 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  351 

aid  ?  "  *  "  Stand  still  and  see  the  salvation  of  God  " 
— such  was  the  telegram  flashed  by  President  Lincoln  on 
one  memorable  occasion.  And  when  Lincoln  had  fallen  ; 
when  the  pojiulation  of  Xew  York  was  wild  with  pas- 
sionate excitement ;  when,  like  a  spark  falling  on  gun- 
powder, a  single  wrong  word  might  have  launched  a 
terrible  multitude  into  conflagration  and  massacre,  Gar- 
field appeared  at  the  window  shaking  a  white  flag,  and 
when  he  had  hushed  the  attention  of  the  multitude  into 
breathless  silence,  what  did  he  say  ?  He  said  :  "Fel- 
low-citizens, clouds  and  darkness  are  round  about  him  ; 
righteousness  and  judgment  are  the  habitations  of  his 
seat."  Again  and  again  the  words  of  Scripture  have 
been  potent  at  the  crises  of  your  history.  "  That 
book,  sir,"  said  President  Andrew  Jackson,  pointing  to 
the  family  Bible,  as  he  lay  on  his  death-bed,  "is  the 
rock  on  which  our  republic  rests."  The  first  words 
ever  flashed  along  an  electric  wire  in  America  were  the 
words,  "What  hath  God  wrought?"  sent  by  a  young  girl 
from  Washington  to  Baltimore.  And  when  man's  science 
subdued  the  forces  of  the  lightning  and  the  ocean,  and 
the  electric  cable  first  thrilled  its  flaming  messages  of 
love  and  hope  "through  the  oozy  dungeons  of  the  ray- 
less  deep,"  almost  the  first  words  flashed  from  hemi- 
sphere to  hemisphere  were  the  divine  message  of  Christ- 
mas, "  Glory  to  God  in  the  highest,  and  on  earth  peace, 
good-will  toward  men." 

VIL  How  quickly,  again,  by  Heaven's  blessing  you  re- 
covered from  the  shock  of  war  ;  how  your  prosperity  ad- 
vanced by  leaps  and  bounds  !    What  the  Priest  Vimont 


*  Franklin. 


352     Farewell  Thoughts  07t  America. 


said  to  the  followers  of  Maisonneuve,  when  they  landed 
at  Montreal,  in  1643,  applies  to  you  :  "  You  are  a  grain 
of  mustard-seed  that  shall  rise  and  grow  till  its  branches 
overshadow  the  earth.  You  are  few,  but  your  work  is 
the  work  of  God.  His  smile  is  on  you,  and  your  chil- 
dren shall  fill  the  land."  It  is  a  theme  too  familiar  to 
dwell  upon  how  a  handful  has  become  a  mighty  nation ; 
how  groups  of  log-huts  have  sprung  in  a  few  years  into 
splendid  cities  ;  how  a  fringe  of  precarious  seaboard  has 
become  an  empire  of  which  the  two  great  seas  of  the 
world  wash  the  one  and  the  other  sliore  ;  how  your  com- 
merce, reaching  to  every  land  and  spreading  white  sails 
on  every  sea,  is  already  a  dangerous  if  friendly  rival  to  the 
commerce  of  England  ;  how  in  a  single  century  of  free- 
dom you  have  sprung  from  one  to  fifty  millions  ;  how  a 
band  of  daring  fugitives  has  become  almost  in  a  century 
the  wealthiest  and  one  of  the  most  powerful  of  all  the 
nations  on  the  globe.  Are  we  not  startled  into  aston- 
ishment when  we  hear  of  those  who  have  spoken  to  men 
whose  grandfathers  remembered  to  have  been  present  as 
children,  in  1704,  at  the  funeral  of  Peregrine  White,  the 
first  English  babe  born  on  the  New  England  shores  ? 
And  now  you  have  more  than  three  millions  of  square 
miles  of  territory  ;  26,000  miles  of  river-way ;  12,000 
miles  of  indented  shore  ;  and  more  than  sixty  millions 
of  living  souls  rich  in  their  "  inherent  and  inalineable 
rights  !  " 

Surely,  you  might  apply  to  yourselves  the  words  of 
Tennyson  : 

"  Our  enemies  have  fallen,  have  fallen;  the  seed. 
The  little  seed  they  laughed  at  in  the  dark, 
Has  risen  and  cleft  the  soil  and  grown  a  bulk 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  353 

Of  spanless  girth  that  lays  on  every  side 

A  thousand  arms  and  rushes  to  the  sun — 

A  night  of  summer  from  the  heat,  a  breath 

Of  autumn  dropping  fruits  of  power;  and  rolled 

With  Music  in  the  growing  breeze  of  Time, 

The  tops  shall  strike  from  star  to  star,  the  fangs 

Shall  move  the  stony  bases  of  the  world." 

VIII.  But  all  this  pompous  detail  of  material  triumphs 
is  worse  than  idle  unless  the  men  of  the  two  countries 
shall  remain  and  shall  become  greater  than  the  mere 
things  that  they  produce,  and  shall  know  how  to  regard 
those  things  simply  as  tools  and  materials  for  the  attain- 
ment of  the  highest  purposes  of  their  being.  The  voice 
of  Milton  tells  you,  as  it  told  England  after  her  civil  dis- 
cord, that 

"  Peace  hath  her  victories 
Not  less  renowned  than  war." 

In  many  directions  you  have  been  mindful  of  those  vic- 
tories. Suffer  me  to  point  out  some  of  your  immense 
gains  and  advantages.  You  have  shown  a  marvellous 
inventiveness.  You  develop  more  quickly,  you  adapt 
more  rapidly  and  unhesitatingly  than  on  the  other  side 
of  the  Atlantic  the  latest  discoveries  and  applications 
of  mechanical  science.  You  have  shown  multitudes 
of  examples  of  that  splendid  munificeace — illustrated 
by  such  names  as  those  of  John  Harvard,  of  George 
Peabody,  of  Peter  Cooper,  of  Johns  Hopkins,  and  many 
more — which  leads  men  who  have  made  colossal  fortunes 
among  you  to  spend  part  at  least  of  those  fortunes  not 
in  the  endowment  of  idle  families,  but  in  enriching 
and  benefiting  the  cities  of  their  birth,  the  nation 
under  whose  gentlest  of  sways  their  path  was  paved 
23 


354     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 


from  the  lot  of  ragged  and  laboring  boys  to  that  of 
an  affluence  beyond  the  dreams  of  avarice.  Your  libra- 
ries, with  their  admirable  card-catalogues,  with  their 
generous  facilities,  with  their  ample  endowments,  with 
their  accumulated  aid  to  research,  ought  to  make  you 
a  nation  of  scholars.  Your  system  of  education  is  one 
of  the  freest  and  most  ungrudging  in  the  world.  Best 
perhaps  of  all,  you  have  developed  and  are  develop- 
ing a  fine  and  original  literature.  You  may  well  be 
proud  of  your  poets :  of  Bryant,  who  "  entered  the 
heart  of  America  through  the  Gate  Beautiful  ; "  of 
Longfellow,  that  pure  and  exquisite  singer,  wiiose  bust 
in  Westminister  Abbey  is  the  delight  of  our  two  na- 
tions ;  of  Edgar  Poe's  weird  genius ;  of  the  living 
fame  of  such  men  as  Lowell  with  his  generous  culture, 
of  Holmes  with  his  sunny  geniality,  of  Whittier  with  his 
passionate  love  of  right  and  hatred  of  wrong.  Among 
your  novelists  you  count  the  honored  names  of  Feni- 
more  Cooper,  the  delight  of  our  boyhood,  of  Nathaniel 
Hawthorne,  whose  works  have  the  immortality  of  true 
genius.  You  have  the  humor  of  James,  of  Howell,  of 
Bret  Harte,  of  Mark  Twain.  You  have  the  brilliant 
histories  of  Washington  Irving,  of  Bancroft,  of  Pres- 
cott,  of  Motley,  of  Parkman.  You  have  the  splendid 
oratory  of  Clay,  of  Daniel  Webster,  of  Wendell  Phillips. 
All  this  is  well.  To  borrow  the  image  suggested  by 
the  late  beloved  Dean  of  Westminister  when  you  wel- 
comed him  among  you,  the  rush  and  fury  of  Niagara 
is  a  type  of  the  life  of  your  people — "  its  devouring, 
perplexing,  fermenting,  bewildering  activity  ; "  but  it 
Avould  lose  nine-tenths  of  its  splendor  and  loveliness,  if 
it  had  not  the  silvery  column  of  spray  above  it  as  the 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  355 


image  of  your  future  history — of  the  upward,  heaven- 
aspiring  destiuy  which  should  emerge  from  the  distrac- 
tions of  your  present.  And  if  that  glittering  column 
of  heaven-ascending  spray  is  to  be  the  type  of  your  as- 
pirations, may  I  not  add  that  the  vivid  rainbow — "  in 
sight  like  unto  an  emerald  " — which  to  my  eyes  lent  its 
chief  glory  to  the  Falls,  may  also  be  the  symbol  of  your 
nation's  hope  ? 

IX.  It  would  be  false  and  idle  to  imply  that  you 
have  no  perils — that  there  are  no  rocks,  no  whirlpools 
which  lie  in  front  of  your  steam-driven  ship  of  state. 
It  is  hardly  for  me,  it  is  not  for  any  stranger  to  dwell 
on  these.  A  stranger  does  not  know,  he  cannot  know 
much  if  anything  about  the  spoils  system ;  about  bosses 
and  bossism  ;  about  the  danger  of  a  secularized  educa- 
tion ;  about  the  subtle  oppression  of  popular  opinion  ; 
about  frauds,  and  rings,  and  municipal  corruption  ; 
about  the  amazing  frivolousness,  the  triviality,  the 
tyranny,  the  ferocity,  the  untruthfulness,  the  reckless 
personality  and  intrusiveness  of  the  baser  portion  of 
your  Press.  He  reads,  indeed,  in  your  leading  jour- 
nals, of  evils  "  calculated  to  humiliate  and  discourage 
those  who  have  both  pride  and  faith  in  republican 
institutions ;  of  political  scandals,  and  commercial  dis- 
honors ;  of  demagogism  in  public  life  ;  of  reckless  finan- 
cial speculations ;  of  a  lessening  sense  of  the  sacred- 
ness  of  marriage  ;  of  defalcations,  malfeasance,  sinister 
legislation,  bought  and  paid  for  by  those  whom  it  bene- 
fits ;  of  a  false  ideal  of  life  which  puts  material  interest 
above  the  spiritual,  and  makes  riches  the  supreme  ob- 
ject of  human  endeavor  and  an  absorbing  passion  for 
paltry  emulations."    Of  all  these  he  reads  in  your  pa- 


356     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 


pers  and  magazines,  and  of  the  warning  of  your  wisest 
writers,  that  "popular  government  is  no  better  than  any 
other  except  the  wisdom  and  virtue  of  the  people  make 
it  so,"  and  that  "  Democracy  has  weakness  as  well  as 
strength."  Clearly  all  these  questions  demand  most 
solemn  care.  As  the  same  voice  has  said,  "when  men 
undertake  to  do  their  own  kingship  they  enter  on  the 
dangers  and  responsibilities  as  well  as  on  the  privi- 
leges of  the  function."  Times  of  long  peace,  times  of 
growing  prosperity  are  times  of  serious  peril.  "About 
the  river  of  human  life  there  is  a  wintry  Avind  but  a 
heavenly  sunshine ;  the  iris  colors  its  agitation,  the 
frost  fixes  on  its  repose."  You  have  freedom,  but  free- 
dom demands  an  eternal  vigilance.  Franklin  warned 
you  a  hundred  years  ago  of  the  peril  of  being  divided 
by  little,  partial,  local  interests.  There  can  be  no 
liberty  without  honesty  and  justice.  "You  may  build 
your  Capitol  of  granite,"  said  Wendell  Phillips,  "and 
pile  it  high  as  the  Eocky  Mountains  ;  if  it  is  founded  on 
or  mixed  up  with  iniquity,  the  pulse  of  a  girl  will  in 
time  beat  it  down."  Public  spirit,  watchfulness,  the 
participation  of  all  in  the  burden  and  heat  of  the  day, 
are  requisite  if  America  would  work  out  her  own  salva- 
tion, and  therewith  almost  the  salvation  of  the  race. 

X.  But  not  for  one  moment  would  your  most  pessi- 
mistic citizen  despair.  To  despair  of  America  would  bo 
to  despair  of  humanity  ;  for  it  would  show  that  men, 
after  all,  have  no  capacity  for  governing  themselves : 
that  they  have,  after  all,  no  nobler  destiny  than  to  be 
the  footstool  of  the  few.* 

*  See  the  speech  of  Franklin  in  the  Convention  for  forming  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  in  1783. 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  357 

And  there  are  two  reasons  why  not  even  the  most 
cynical  pessimist  need  despair  of  America — the  one 
because  your  government  is  a  government  of  manhood, 
the  other,  because  you  have  succeeded  in  training  men. 
It  is  a  government  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  for  the 
people.  The  multitude  may  sometimes  be  careless  and 
supine  ;  it  may  fail  to  understand  the  responsiblities 
which  attach  to  liberty.  But  sooner  or  later  it  awakens 
in  all  its  strength  and  treads  wicked  laws  and  base  com- 
binations under  its  feet.  The  rousing  of  a  magnificent 
people  when  it  "  views  its  mighty  youth,  and  shakes  its 
invincible  locks,"  is  as  when 

"  The  lion  shakes  the  dew-drop  from  its  mane." 

Nay,  even  these  metaphors  of  Shakespeare  and  Milton 
are  too  weak  to  image  forth  the  outburst  of  volcanic 
wrath  which  sometimes,  almost  in  a  moment,  transforms 
a  peaceful  and  careless  commonwealth  into  terrific  and 
irresistible  agitation,  as  vast  subterranean  forces  in  one 
moment  transform  into  bellowing  eruption  the  moun- 
tain which  but  yesterday  had  snow  in  its  long-slumber- 
ing crater,  and  gardens  and  vineyards  upon  its  sunny 
Elopes. 

I  ask,  then,  with  President  Lincoln  in  his  first  Inau- 
gural Address:  "  Why  should  there  not  be  a  patient  con- 
fidence in  the  ultimate  justice  of  the  people?  Is  there 
any  better  or  equal  hope  in  the  world  ?  " 

Shakespeare  in  his  day  complained  that 

"  Not  a  man,  for  being  simply  man, 
Hath  any  honor,  but  honor  for  those  honors 
That  are  without  him — as  place,  riches,  favor. 
Prizes  of  accident  as  oft  as  merit. " 


358     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 


It  has  not  been  so  with  you.  You  have  felt  the  sacred- 
ness  of  manhood,  the  dignity  of  manhood,  the  illimit- 
able horizon  of  its  hopes,  the  immeasurable  capability  of 
its  powers.  Your  very  Declaration  of  Independence 
lays  it  down  as  a  self-evident  truth,  "  that  all  men  are 
created  equal ;  that  they  are  endowed  by  their  Creator 
with  certain  inalienable  rights ;  that  among  these  are 
life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness."  If  often 
upon  a  small  scale  in  local  communities,  and  upon  a 
large  scale  in  your  national  history,  you  have  witnessed 
the  irresistible  revolt  of  the  national  conscience  against 
the  growth  of  intolerable  wrongs,  the  cause  of  this  latent 
force  is  because  you  have  honored  men  simply  as  men. 

From  the  street  and  from  the  store,  from  the  forest 
and  from  the  prairie,  you  have  taken  ragged,  bright- 
eyed  boys,  with  little  or  no  regular  education  even,  but 
enriched  by  the  lessons  of  experience  and  crowned  and 
mitred  by  the  hands  of  invisible  consecration,  and  not 
asking  who  they  were  but  only  what  they  have  proved 
themselves  capable  to  be — because  of  their  homely  wis- 
dom, because  of  their  native  strength,  because  of  their 
undaunted  righteousness — you  have  fearlessly  set  them 
to  command  a  million  of  your  soldiers,  to  rule  over  fifty 
millions  of  their  fellow-men.  Such  a  man  was  James 
Garfield  ;  such  a  man  was  Ulysses  Grant ;  such  a  man 
was  Abraham  Lincoln.  Were  manlier  words  ever  spoken 
than  those  with  which  he  ended  his  New  York  speech  in 
1860  :  "  Let  us  have  faith  that  right  makes  might ;  and 
in  that  faith  let  us  to  the  end  dare  to  do  our  duty  as 
we  understand  it."  A  man,  in  one  aspect,  may  be  but 
a  shadow  and  a  vapor  ;  in  another,  he  is  immortal,  im- 
measurable, infinite,  and  he  is  never  so  great  as  when  he 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  359 


is  uplifted  by  the  aspirations  of  a  great  land.  "  Govern- 
ments, religion,  property,  books,"  said  Humboldt,  "are 
nothing  but  the  sciifTolding  to  build  a  man.  Eartli  holds 
up  to  her  Master  no  fruit  but  the  finished  man."  "  Man- 
kind," said  Kossuth,  "has  but  one  single  object — man- 
kind itself ;  and  that  object  has  but  one  single  instru- 
ment— mankind  again."  "  Men,"  said  Pericles,  "are  a 
city,  and  not  walls."  The  prayer  of  every  great  com- 
munity should  ever  be,  0  God,  give  us  men. 

"What  constitutes  a  State  ?  "  asks  Sir  William  Jones 
in  his  ode  in  imitation  of  Alcseus. 

"  Not  high-raised  battlement  or  labored  mound, 
Thick  walls  or  moated  gate  ; 

Not  cities  proud,  with  spires  and  turrets  crowned  ; 

Not  bays  and  broad-armed  ports, 

Where,  laughing  at  the  storm,  rich  navies  ride  ; 

Not  starred  and  spangled  courts. 

No!  Men — high  minded  men  ; 

Men  who  iheir  duties  know, 

An(l*know  their  rights,  and,  knowing,  dare  maintain  ; 

Prevent  the  long-aimed  blow, 

And  crush  the  tyrant,  while  they  rend  the  chain — 

These  constitute  a  state: 

And  sovereign  Law  that,  with  collected  will. 

On  crowns  and  globes  elate 

Sits  empress,  crowning  good,  repressing  ill." 

XI.  But  am  I  wrong  in  saying — if  I  am  you  will  for- 
give me,  for  it  is  only  the  impression  to  which  I  have 
been  led  by  studying  the  minds  of  some  of  your  greatest 
thinkers — am  I  wrong  in  saying  that  iit  this  moment  in 
her  history  America  needs  notliiiig  more  imperatively 
than  a  new  and  concentrated  enthusiasm  ?  If  Prophets 
be  needed  to  stir  up  the  monotony  of  wealtli,  and  re- 


360     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 

awaken  the  people  to  the  great  ideals  which  are  con- 
stantly fading  out  of  their  minds — "  to  trouble  the  waters 
that  there  may  be  health  in  their  flow  " — in  what  direc- 
tions could  such  Prophets  point  which  should  give  any 
grander  aims  than  the  achievement  of  the  old  eternal 
ideals  ?  "  That  motionless  shaft,"  said  Daniel  Webster, 
pointing  to  the  pillar  on  Bunker  Hill,  "  will  be  the  most 
powerful  of  speakers.  Its  speech  will  be  of  civil  and  re- 
ligious liberty.  It  will  speak  of  patriotism  and  of  cour- 
age. It  will  speak  of  the  moral  improvement  and  eleva- 
tion of  mankind.  Decrepit  age  leaning  against  its  base, 
and  ingenuous  youth  gathering  round  it,  will  speak  to 
each  other  of  the  glorious  events  with  which  it  is  con- 
nected, and  exclaim,  "  Thank  God !  I  also  am  an 
American."  But  that  depends.  The  boast  of  ancestral 
excellence  is  worse  than  unavailing  if  it  be  used  by  the 
lips  of  degenerate  descendants.  Vast  is  the  work  before 
America,  and  if  in  her  the  nations  of  the  world,  are  to 
be  blessed,  that  work  will  need,  all  her  seriousness  and 
all  her  energy. 

I  have  endeavored  to  emphasize  the  thought  on  which 
all  your  own  greatest  and  best  men  have  insisted,  that  the 
hand  of  God  is  pre-eminently  manifest  in  your  history ; 
and  the  correlative  thought,  that  there  rests  upon  the 
American  nation  an  immense  burden  of  heaven-imposed 
responsibility. 

What  is  that  responsibility  ? 

It  is  to  combine  the  old  with  the  new— the  experience 
of  the  East  with  the  daring  of  the  West—"  the  long  past 
of  Europe  with  the  long  future  of  America." 

It  is  to  guard  the  idea  of  Freedom  as  the  fabled  dragon 
guarded  of  old  the  yery  garden  of  the  Hesperides— tak- 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  361 


ing  good  heed  that  liberty  be  not  confound  with  license ; 
nor  republican  government  with  the  shout  of  popular 
anarchy  ;  nor  freedom  with  the  freedom  to  do  wrong  un- 
punished ;  nor  manly  independence  with  lawless  self- 
assertion.  It  is  to  keep  the  equilibrium  between  stability 
and  advance,  between  liberty  and  law.  "As  for  me," 
said  Patrick  Henry,  in  1775,  "give  me  liberty  or  give 
me  death." 

It  is  to  work  out  the  conception  of  Progress  ;  to  recog- 
nize that  it  is  your  duty  not  only  to  preserve  but  to  im- 
prove ;  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  living  sap  of  to-day 
outgrows  the  dead  rind  of  yesterday.  You  and  your 
churches  will  have  to  decide  whether,  in  the  words 
of  Castelar,  you  will  confound  yourselves  with  Asia, 
"placing  upon  the  land  old  altars,  and  upon  the  altars 
old  idols,  and  ujwn  the  idols  immovable  theocracies,  and 
upon  the  theocracies  despotic  empires  ;  or  whether  by 
labor  and  by  liberty  you  will  advance  the  grand  work 
of  universal  civilization."  Despots,  whether  priestly  or 
secular,  may  they  "stand  still  !"  But 

"  God  to  the  human  soul. 

And  all  the  spheres  that  roll 
Wrapped  by  her  spirit  in  their  robes  of  light, 

Hath  said,  '  The  primal  plan 

Of  all  the  world  and  man 
Is  Forward !    Progress  is  your  law,  your  right ! ' " 

It  is  to  work  out  a  manly  and  intelligent  correlation 
of  religious  tradition  with  the  advancing  knowledge  of 
mankind.  The  churches  must  show  to  the  world  the  rare 
example  of  religious  tolerance ;  of  many  folds  existing 
happily  side  by  side  in  the  one  flock.  The  laity  must 
teach  their  churches  not  to  supersede  but  to  supplement 


362     Farewell  Thoughts  on  Ameri<-a. 

each  other.  They  must  beware  of  stagnant  doctrines  and 
stereotyped  formulae.  They  must  learn  the  spirit  of  those 
grand  words  in  which  John  Robinson  addressed  the  Pil- 
grim Fathers  when  they  sailed  from  the  shores  of  Eu- 
rope— I  am  persuaded  that  the  Lord  hath  more  truth 
yet  to  come  for  us  ;  yet  to  break  forth  out  of  His  Holy 
Word.  Neither  Luther  nor  Calvin  has  penetrated  into 
the  counsel  of  God." 

"  New  occasions  teach  new  duties, 

Time  makes  ancient  good  uncouth; 
They  must  upwards  still,  and  onwards, 
Who  would  keep  abreast  with  Truth." 

Judge  Sewell  set  a  noble  example  when,  in  1696,  he 
stood  up  in  his  pew  in  the  Old  South  Church  to  confess 
his  contrition  for  his  share  in  the  witchcraft  delusion  of 
1692. 

That  preacher  of  Georgia  spoke  wise  words  who, 
taunted  with  a  change  of  ojnnion  about  slavery,  said  in 
a  Thanksgiving  sermon,  "I  have  got  new  light.  I  now 
believe  many  things  which  I  did  not  believe  twenty 
years  ago.  ...  If  I  live  till  1900  I  expect  to  be- 
lieve some  things  which  I  now  reject  and  to  reject  some 
things  which  I  now  believe; — and  I  shall  not  be  alone." 

It  is,  above  all,  to  show  the  nations  the  true  ideal 
of  national  righteousness.  Two  centuries  and  a  half 
have  passed  since  Peter  Bulkley  addressed  to  his  little 
congregation  of  exiles  the  memorable  words  :  "There  is 
no  people  but  will  strive  to  excel  in  something.  What 
can  we  excel  in  if  not  in  holiness  ?  If  we  look  to  num- 
bers we  are  the  fewest  ;  if  to  strength  we  are  the  weak- 
est ;  if  to  wealth  and  riches  we  are  the  poorest  of  all 


* 


Farewell  Thoughts  on  America.  363 

the  people  of  God  throughout  the  world.  We  cannot 
excel  nor  so  much  as  equal  other  people  in  these  things, 
and  if  we  come  short  in  grace  and  holiness  we  are  the 
most  desjiicable  people  under  heaven.  Strive  we  there- 
fore to  excel,  and  suffer  not  this  crown  to  be  taken  from 
us." 

How  has  all  this  been  reversed  !  In  numbers  you 
are  now,  or  soon  inevitably  must  be,  the  greatest ;  in 
strength  the  most  overwhelming  ;  in  wealth  the  most 
affluent  of  all  the  Christian  nations  throughout  the 
world.  In  these  things  you  not  only  equal  other  people 
but  excel  them.  Why  ?  Mainly,  I  believe,  because 
your  fathers  feared  God.  Shall  America  then  dare  to 
kick  down  that  ladder,  to  spurn  the  low  degrees  by 
which  she  did  ascend,  and,  despising  the  holiness  which 
was  once  her  single  excellence,  now  in  the  days  of  her 
boundless  prosperity  to  make  in  the  common  life  of  her 
citizens  a  league  with  death  and  a  covenant  with  hell? 
I  do  not  for  a  moment  believe  it.  I  believe  that  she 
will  be  preserved  from  all  such  perils  by  the  memo- 
ries of  the  dead  and  the  virtues  of  the  living.  I  believe 
that  she  will  cherish  the  pure  homes  which  have 
never  lost  their  ancient  English  dower  of  inward 
happiness,  I  believe  that  she  will  not  suffer  the  wise 
voices  of  the  holy  and  thoughtful  few  to  be  drowned  in 
noisier  and  baser  sounds.  I  believe  that  her  aspirations 
will  dilate  and  conspire  with  the  breezes  from  the  sea 
which  sweep  the  vast  horizons  of  your  territory.  I  be- 
lieve that  she  will  listen  to  the  three  great  Angels  of 
History,  of  Conscience,  of  Experience,  which,  as  the 
great  teachers  of  mankind,  ever  repeat  to  us  the  eternal 
accents  of  •Hie  Moral  Law.  I  believe  that  she  will  help  to 


364     Farewell  Thoughts  on  America. 


disenchant  the  nations  of  the  horrible  seductions  of  war, 
and  of  a  peace  crushed  and  encumbered  under  warlike 
armaments.  I  believe  that  she  is  linked,  that  she  will 
ever  desire  to  be  linked,  with  us  of  the  old  home,  in  the 
golden  yoke  of  amity,  and  that  by  the  blessing  of  God's 
peculiar  grace,  you  with  us  and  we  with  you,  shall  be 
enabled  to  "make  all  things  new"  for  the  glory  and 
happiness  of  mankind.  Then  shall  hoary-headed  selfish- 
ness receive  its  death-blow,  and  the  vilest  evils  which 
have  afflicted  the  corporate  life  of  man 

"  Shall  live  but  in  the  memory  of  Time, 
Which  like  a  penitent  libertine  shall  start, 
Look  back,  and  shudder  at  his  former  years." 


Date  Due 

Mr  1  '40 

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